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SHELLEY.

MR. HORNELL'S LECTURE. Au extremely able and interesting Tecturo on Shelley's "Adonais" was delivered by the Vice-Chancellor of the Hongkong University (Mr. W. W. Hur zeli, CLE, MA), in the St. John's Cathedral Hall, yesterday, evening. Prof. I Forster was in the chain,

The Hon. Sir Claud Severn was among

which was as follows:

THE HONGKONG DAILY PRESS, WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 11TH, 1925

Severn was also buried, in due course, the victim, na he believed of an unmerited

in the old Protestant Cemetery in Rome.ption"

Indeed his grave is alongside that of Jehu Keats, the and his friend

moved him to sorrow and

"

The Adenis belongs to that class

of elegiac, poens, which does not aim t perpetuating the memory of the dead by a monumental portrait, but rather cele brates the dead through a celebration of grief, and an impassioned meditation upon death. We do not know Keats more truly, when we have read Shelley's poems, but our spirits are allowed to contemplate aright, the, untimely, and sudden with drawal at whatever time and place, of Bright

we must lament, but which is only apparent," and not real.

OBITUARY.

JR. WA J. COOPER.

We regret to record the death of Mr. William Alfred John Cooper, who for nearly fourteen years had con in the service of the Government na a land surveyor,

The late Mr. Cooper catered the Gör. ernment Civil Hospital fortnight ago For a suffering from typhoid fever. week past his condition had been critical and he passed away at elever, o'clock yes.

the interested listeners to the lecture, the disease was there before they can drawal wh from the earth- with terday morning.

41

1

The deceased gentleman came to the Colony in 1911, having previously had engineering experience in the Dublin Board of Public Works, and in Northern- and Southern Nigeria on railways. He joined the Hongkong Governant service as a land surveyor in the Public Works Department.

T have mentioned the publication in Apell, isis, of Endymion I have also mentioned that in 1820, when Keats was un the eve of his departure from England, the general indifference of the public, and the ridicule and abuse with which certain reviewers hail received his poems, were among the causes which contributed to the poet's misery. Undoubtedly these harassments hasteaed Keats' death, but

Kents mother died of consumption, and au dul his younger brother, and the first

Shelley chose, as a foundation for his symptoms of the disease appeared in ists: but Shelley appears to have be poem, the lament of Bion for Adonais, Anlieved that it was the brutal ankindness and of Mcsehus for Bion Bion was born the review of Endymion which ap-in Smyres about 280 B.C.. but spent the peared in the "Quarterly Review" which last years of his life in Sicily: Moschus duced the disease which killed Kents. who was born in Syracuse about 250 B.C. Keats was, a fact, attacked in two was Bion's pupil. Both Bion and Mos- periodicals The Quarterly Review," thus were imitators of Theocritus. the and Blackwood's Magazine!" Shelley great Greek Swvilian pect of the 3rd Quar-century BC. They wrote poems about secus to have known about the terly Review" attack only; at any rate he the country-about the shepherds" and refore to the Blackwood's Mag-shepherdesses, their joys and their loves zine attack. The Blackwood's Magn Adonate was a beautiful youth, loyed by

attack was taunting and insulting. Aphrodite, whose untimely death is the The funeral took place yesterday even- while the attack minde by the Quarterly subject of Bion's lament. Bion was poiing at Happy Valley, the service being Review" was sneering and supercilious. scued and his death was the subject of conducted by the Rev. F. P. Copley. The attack made in "Blackwood's Magu- latent in linsehus great poem. Shel Moyir.

The chief mourner

was Mr. H. A xine seems to have annoyed Keats mast, leg's preface to Adonais, has at its head though possibly the sacers of the "Quar- two quolations. The Best is a quotation Lammiers, and the following attended: terly Review are bore damaging to from Plato the poet, not the philosopher, The Hon. Mr. H. T. Creasy (Director his literary reputation.

but the comic peet, and dontemporary of of Public Works), Mr. A. E. Wright Aristophanes, and was translated by (Building Authority), Messrs. LE Shelley himself, as follows:-

Lammert, Mr. A. F. Hollingsworth, I. "That wort the morning star among the E. Goldsmith, H. Pegg, E. B. Reed, F.

living

M. Crawford, H. T. Jackman, H. A. Seth, A. Stevenson, H. Sbrusole, J. Oxberry, Fred Ellis, J. P. Robinson; Cape Smith, M.B.E., and many other friends.

never

+5

The title which Shelley himself gave to the poeta was Adonais-An Elegy on tue death John Keats, author of

Endymion, Hyperion," Ct. elly is a song of lamentation, especially- for the dead, though it is often used vaguely for other poems.

John Kents was born at the Sway and Hoop" i tule mist, 1793.

lives stables in Meerfields, John Keats father was Thomas Keats, and his mother was Frances Jenzinga The livery stable belonged to Frances Jennings father and Thomas Beats, the poet's father, was the principal stable 12an, or assistant, in the business, John Keats as leg was sent to a school kept by a reverend geatleman at Entel. The reverend geletana was the Rev. John Clarke, and his son was Charles Contlen Clarke. Jeba Keats did not show any remarkable talent at school: he was described as a very ordinary scholar, it is interesting to find, that as recently, and is said to have been active, pugnaas ison, Jr. Augustine Birrell, in one of cious and popular among school bis inimitable essays, had a sly dig at fellows. He Was niso said to have

the acquired a fale amount of Latin, but no Greek. His father died from a fell from of Mr. Birrell's essay, which is entitled

the Quarterly Review and Literature a bong, in April. His mother was an article which had appeared in that maried, and died of consumption in periodical entitled "Penny Fiction Felruary, 1810, Before the close of the

The article lamented the Quarterly game year, John Keats left school and

Review"

is always lamenting, Mr. Bir was apprenticed to a surgeon at Edmon-rell groans.-in his heart of hearts he is tod. fo July, 1st, he passed with credit still the same creature as he or she who an examination at the Apothecaries' Ilali reviewed "Jane Eyre in the December

In 1812 Keats read for the first tine

He still regrets. the number, 19.

Quarterly Review," The occasion

Spenser's For Queen," anel was levelling spirit of the age, still abhors wildly fascinated by it. He read other equality, still believes in boba, and curt

Ere thy fair light had fled Now, having died. thou art as Hesperus,

giving New splendour to the dead."!

1

He was 30 years of age and leaves a widow (a sister of Mrs. H. A. Lammers) and two young daughters, for whom the deepest sympathy is felt by a large circle of friends. THE FUNERAL

The second quotation is from the lament

A wreath sent by the widow was buried of Moschus far Bion, and it may be trans with the coin. Floral tributes were also lated as follows:

sent by the following:-"Bertie, Florence Poison canie, Bion, to thy mouth-Land Alfred" "Norcen and Fat" Hon. thou didst kaow poison. To such lips Mr. E. D. C. Wolfe (Captain Superio- as thine did it "come, and was not cendent of Police), Hon. Ir. H. T. and sweetened What mortal was so cruel Mrs. Creasy. Mr. John C. Fletcher, Mr. .that could mix poison for thee, or who-

newhere trace-

poenis also, and the surgery became hate seys, and in the divine right of the upper scald give thee the venom that heard and Mrs. Geo. Lammort, Mr. and Mrs. ful Finally he abandoned his intended

thy voice! Surely he had no masic in Sym Thompson, Mr. C. A. Grimes, Mr. A. Et Lissaman, Mr. and Mrs. profession, and for the remainder of his classes to be reverenced by the lower.

Well, the article famented the his soul.

Waller G. Joseph, Mr. and Mrs. John Adonais The naibe. life as had definite occupation other shocking bad taste in letters of the aver than that of writing verse. From his

age Board School boy. This boy, it ap-able in classical Greek literature. It has Duncan, Miss M. Sloane, Mr. and Mrs. grandparents he inherited a moderate sum of money, just enough to give him pears, had the-impudence to prefer-at sometimes been regarded as a form of C. Stark, Mr. and Mrs. Edward New- least so the "Quarterly Review assert the name Adonis in the Doric dialect.house, Mr. and Mrs. L Forster, Mr. start in life. He made the acquainted. Spring Hected Jack," or the

Ter: Another suggestion is that it is the female and Mrs. V. Borby, Mr. and Mrs. E. M. jag a paper called the miner." Amongnal of Lady Brassey ance of Leigh Hunt, who was then edit-rer of Loudon, to the fascinating jour form of the name Adonis Another Raymond, Mr. and Mrs B. H. Collis Hallows, Mr. and Mrs. T. S. Morrison; This Mr. Birrell that it is Shelley's varian: for Adonins other friends we hear of Joka luat the remarked, if true, is sak; but there were the women's yearly lament for Adonis. Ir. and Mrs. B. D. Evans. Mr. and publisher, and Charles Wentworth Dilke. once reviewers in the ll of mature On the other hand Adonais may res. Mr. H. West, Mr. and Mrs. A. E who afterwards beenme editor of the ven

years, and Uciversity terining who pre sibly mean a poem about "Adonis Wright, Mr. and Mrs. H. C. Birkett, Mr. and Mrs. S. H. Dutton, Mr. and Athenien, of the painter Haydon and ferred the poetry of the Rev. Mr. Milllament about Adonis, in the same way as others. This first book of poems was pulman, and the Rev. Mr. Atherstone

Thebais

is a poem about Thebes. Mrs. A. Stevenson. Mr. and Mrs. 0. B. Jished in 1917.

Mrs. and Miss Hazeland, Mr. and Mrs. To Aurit sis. be published Endy. (author of that stirring work, The Fall But the melody of the name is probably Raven, Mr. and Mrs.. W. Logan, Mr., of Nineveh), to the poetry of John what commended it to Shelley. At any mion. In June of the same year, Keals Keats. The admiring reader of Spring rate the whole subject of the elegy, is W. Farmer, Mr. and Mrs. W. B. Hind, Went for a "walking tour in Scotland and Heeled Jack Birrell concluded), treated by Shelley as a transposition of Mr. and Mrs. A. Anderson, Mr. and Mrs. North Ireland with one Armitage Brown lefs, school for the factory, or the work the lament as conceived by Bion of the R. A. Macdougall, Mr. and Mrs. H. E Brown, who was Keats' most intimate

Goldsmith, Mr. and Mrs. L'E. Lammert, friend, had been a Russian merabant, and shop, aged thirteen. It would have been Cyprian Aphrodite for Adonis. subsequent wrote a bock, an Shake decept to have shown him some little But Shelley transmuted the material of Mr. and Mrs. Petley, Mr. and Mrs. A.

consideration."

Bion and Muschus into tho substance of H. Hollingsworth, Mr. and Mrs. F peare's Sonnets. In July, Keats caught

spiritualized modern thoughts The art of Sutton, Mr. and Mrs. E. Larmour, Mr. a chill and showed the first symptoms of

Bion and Moschus is translated intentheaud Mrs. H. T. Jackman, Mr. and Mrs. the disease which was subsequently to

sphere of metaphysical imagination, that G. M. Dalgety, Mr. and Mrs. G. H. cause his death. He cut short his tour

is to say, into the sphere of the imagina Bannerman, Mr. and Mrs. E. W. Car. and returned to Hampstead to purse his

tion dealing with the problems of being penter, Mr. and Mrs. Fraton Raven, younger brother Tom, who died of con-

and knowing. Crania, the heavenly god. Mr. and Mrs. E. Bullock, Mr. and Mrs. sumption in December of that year.

It was in the house of the Dilkes in

dess of Love, takes the place of Aphro-F. A. Perry, Mr. and Birs, J. Witchell, uite, the goddess of passion and desire: Mr. and Mrs. L. S. Greenhill, Mr. and the autumn of 1818,that Keats met Miss

the thoughts and fancies, and desires of Mrs. Owen Hughes, Mr. and Mrs. R. S. Faany Brawne. He fell desperately in

Keats, take the place of the loves or Logan, Mr. and Mrs B. A. Hale, Mr. love with her, having, as he himself ex.

cupids of Bion's Elegy

and Airs. E. F. Aucott, Mr. and Mrs. plained a swooning admiration of her beauty On the night of the ard of February, 1820, Keats had his first attack of blood-spitting from the lungs. He allied, but in fane 1820 he had a danger ous relapse. It was just about that time, that his final volume of verse was pub

fished.

«

St

To return to Keats. A series of arti cles on the Cockney school of poetry was begun in Binckwood's 31agazine" in 17. These articles were directed main y, and most venomously agaiäst Leigh funt. The fourth of these articles, which seems to have appeared in August

118 fell foul of Keats.

The attack in the Quarterly Review appeared in September of the same year. The criticism of the Quarterly Review was not what Shelley calls it la his pre

face to

All he had loved, and moulded into

thought Adonais savage, it is

! rucher contemptuous. It undoubtedly points out what are real defects in

Endymion," The "grounds On which one can fairly object to the criticism, are that its tone is purposely ill-natured, Its

"

Front shape and hue and odour, and

sweet sound, Lamented Adonais. Instead of mountain thepherds, the living poets are called to lament round of Shelley....

P. Robinson und "Bonnie," Mr. and Mrs. F. M. Crawford, Mr. and Mrs. A. D. Humphreys, M. and Mrs E; Mit- chell, Mr. and Mrs. M. Henderson, Mr. and Mrs. and Miss Finlay Miller, Afr. and Mre. Grant Simpson, Mr. and Mrs. A. B. Purves, Mr. and Mrs. J.

e contains, all his best pocins recognition of inèrits out of all propor- his biet. These, stanzas contain a picture Oxberry, Mr. and Mrs. C. Bond. Mr.

ناهم

"the transition from death, sorrow and

Cox, C. F. Douglas and J. Angwin.

Government of Hongkong, Colleagues, P.W.D., Officers and Brethren, Victoria Lodge, Perseverance. Lodge, Zetland Lodge, Institute of Engineers and Ship- builders, Committee and members Hong Building Ordinance Staff, Survey Office, Drawing Office (Chinese staff). Chinese Surveyors, Messrs. Burford, Hollands, and Brett, and Mr. Lai Ming Kai

MR. A. B. ROSENFELD.

Hyperion." The Eve of tion to its censure of defects; also that

and Mrs. E. B. Reed, Mr and Mrs. D. Lamia" and the leading it shows prejudice, in that it disparages Stanza 3 refers to Leigh Hunt. Odes. His doctor ordered him off to

Keats not so much for his poetical errors, In stangas 20, and 28, Shelles lashes Reid, Mr. and Mrs. E. Humphreys, Mrs. Italy. Keats was now exceedingly an happy. He was passionately in love and the literary and political antaditor of comes the great turning point of the poema Lanbert. J. H. Seth, HL Seth, H. H as because he was a friend of Leigh Hunt, the writer of the Critique" in the Cormack, Madame Lity, Mr. P. and Miss Quarterly Review," On this point Farell, Dr. McKenny, Mesara, F. Lam- mert, L. M. Warte, C. E. Falkner, E. B. insanely jealous, and his jealousy made

the Quarterly Beview." hize suspicious of his best men friends, the Review, whose name was Gifford, The public was generally indifferent to was long regarded as the author of the the past to immortality, joy and the rape B Frost, A. G. Pile W his poetry, and the reviewers bad poured review, but it is now known that it was

ture of things that can not pass away Russell, E. B. Dickie, IL S. Rouse, H. scorn and ridicule on it. He had little written by a man called Croker.

The first part of the poem leads naturally. Phelips, T. Dallin, A. M. Stark, H. C. Shrubacle, P. D. Wilson, C. Earn- merey, and if he lived, his future was Shelley appears to have first met Keats to the second and the poem is one ashan R. E. Skelton, E. A Girling, J. S. precarious. Over him there hung the pro- in February, 1811, but Keats did not take harmonious whole. spect of an early death closing a painful so kindly to Shelley, as Shelley did to Stanzas 30, 40, 41, 42 and 43 are in a and harassing ilinecas. "And he and Funny Keats. Keats yas sensitive on the score sense the percration or summing up of Brawne had to part,

of his origin. In 1819, we hear of Keats the poem. They are a sublime declard On the 18th of Septemher, 1820, John accusing Shelley and Leigh Hunt of a tion of Shelley's philosophy of man's rela Kenta sailed from England in the com- wish to see him undervalued. When tion to the universe. We are not analysing pany of a young artist called Joseph Shelley and his second wife settled in a philosophical exposition and it is fatile Severa. In October they landed in Great Mariow in 1817, it secins that he to try and fix precisely Shelley's theorica kons Club, Waterworks Department, Naples, and towards the end of Novem- asked Keats to become a member of the about existence after death and much ber, they reached Rome. In Home & dce-household. In 1820, Shelley, hearing of less to inhel them. Keats' soul has been tor called James Clarke (be subsequently Keat's iilness, wrote and invited him to absorbed into primeval nature forces; his became Sir James Clarke) looked after come and live with him in Italy as his thoughts have become blended with the Keats with every sure, and Severn's de- guest. Shelley also wrote to the editor universal spirit of beauty. votion never failed bis friend. But all of the "Quarterly Review letter ut But this absorption is not enough to was of no avail John Keats died on the protest against the article that attacked satisfy man'a yearnings alter immortality. 23rd of February, 1621, and was buried in Keats; but this letter, like so many of Therefore in the next 3 stanzas (41. 45 The death occurred at Shanghai on the old Protesthat Cemetery of Rome Shelley's was never sent. Writing to and 48) the indestructibility of the per- February 4th, of Mr. A. B. Rosenfeld, under a Hitle seulptured tomb, on which Thomas Love. Peacock in 1820, Sheller sonal self is presented to us as the soul founder of the firm of Mesars A. B. is carved a Greek lyre. His epitaph he says, with reference to Keats' last volume of Adonais passes into the company of Rosenfeld & Son, who has long been one composed himself. Here lies one whose ruutne was writ in water. In his Preface of poems, that it was insignificant enough the illustrious dead, who, like him, met of the lending cotton merchants of the Far East. Death was due to an affec Hyperion. Writing to Mre.untimely deaths. to Adonais

except for Shelley wrote-" The Leigh Hunt, the same month, he says that Then Shelley turns once more to the tion of the heart. cemetery is an open space among the Hyperion" promises for Keate that he dead Adonais. He is lead and bis body Mr. Rosenfeld was one of Shanghai's ruins, covered in winter with violets and is destined to become one of the finest lies buried in Rome Let him who per-popular and prominent old time resid daisies. It might make one in love with writers of his age; but, that his other sists in mourning Adonais compare him- ents and he pot only witnessed but was death, to think that one should be buried things are imperfact enough...

and

self with Adondis and then think of him-closely, identified with much of the pro 30 sweet a place. Within a year, the what is worse, written in that bad self in comparison with the universe,gress and growth of Shanghai - during ashes of Percy Bysshe Shelley were laid sort of style which is becoming fashion-within which he is but an infinitesimal the past thirty years. He was 2 years close by.

*** abic

among those who fancy that they speck. Let him go to Rome where ages, of age. Besides his widow, he is surviv Of Joseph Severn. Shelley wrote (also are imitating Huat and Wordsworth, einpires and religions le buried in the ed by an only son, tr. Julius Rosenfeld

such In the Prefice to ""Adonais "):

In the same letter he says that the is ruins they have wrought. Keats and Mr. Rosenfeld was one of the outstand- He (Keats) was accompanied to anxiously expecting Kents in Italy, as he gain no adventitious or accidental ing figures in Masonry in the Far East, Rome and attended in his last illaess, when I shall take care to bestow every honours from having heen buried in Rome for in succession he held the highest by Mr. Sevoru, a young artist of the possible attention on hian Icons deeply for being the kings of thought, they Bite, the Royal Arch Masons and Nomad I consider his amidst this wreek, They confer honour, posts of Saltour Lodge, the Scottish highest promise, who, I have been; in- a most formed, almost risked his own life, and interested in his safety I intend to be were not dragged down in the ruin of Oasis, and the Shanghai Order of the sacrificed every prospect, to unwearied the physician both of his body and his institutions, rather, they contended Mystic, Shrine. He was a member of attendance upon his dying friend. Had soul, to keep one warm, and to teach against that ruin. In this way Keats the American Club, the Shanghai Race I known there circumstances before the the other Greek and Spanish. I am resting place is introduced beneath the Club and the Cercle Sportif Francais, completion of

y! poem, I should have aware indeed, in part, that I am nourish pyramid of Cestius and this reminds been tempted to add my feeble tribute ing a rival who will far surpass me; but shelley of his own little boy buried in of applante to the more solid recom- this is an added motive, and will be an the same cemetery and of all the miserise note struck in the concluding stanzas is ponse which the virtuous man finds in added pleasure.

of life from which death afone is the a personal one. Commenting on these the recollection of his own motives. Keats died on the 23rd of February, refuge. This is worked out in stanzas livca, John Addington Bymonds refers to "Mr. Soyers can diapense with a reward 1821. His death was announced in the 47 to 51. Then again, the thought of Shelley, as "one whom mystery and from such stuff as dreams are made Examiner of March 20th and it was death as the deliverer, the revealer mourning still oppress on earth.” of His conduct is a golden augury probably from these pages, or from a through whom the soul of man is re- And Symonds dads in the conclusion of the success of his future career-may letter of one Horace Smith, that Shelley united to the spirit of the universe reto Adonais that highest of all Shelley's. the unextinguished spirit of his illus first heard the rows. He certainly did turns and on this note the poem closes qualities the liberation of incalculable trious friend animate the creations of not hear the news until more than a The note is a more solemn one than that energies, the emancipation and expan his pencil, and plead against Oblivion month after the event.Deep personal which was struck in atanzas 39 to 43, the sion of a force within the soul, victorious for his name?

affection for Kents," Professor Dowden stanzas which greeted the passage of The Colonial Secretary of Hongkong is writes, Sholley had never felt, but the Adonais into the eternal world. And the grandson of Joseph Berera, Joseph) satimely death of a young man of genius, 1 (Continued of foot of next Column)

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