By A Gentleman Of The University Of Oxford. For assisting to Maintain In Prison Mr. Peter Finerty, Imprisoned For A Libel. London: Sold by B. Crosby and Co., And All Other Booksellers. 1811.'
(_b_) Four advertisements of the same poem in London newspapers; two of them being in the _Morning Chronicle_ for 15th and 21st March, 1811, whilst the other two may be found in the _Times_ for 10th and 11th April, 1811.
(_c_) These words by an anonymous writer in the _Dublin Weekly Messenger_ of 7th March, 1812:--
'We have but one more word to add. Mr. Shelley, commiserating the sufferings of our distinguished countryman, Mr. Finerty, whose exertions in the cause of political freedom he much admired, wrote a very beautiful poem, the profits of the sale of which, we understand, from undoubted authority, Mr. Shelley remitted to Mr. Finerty. We have heard they amounted to nearly an hundred pounds. This fact speaks a volume in favour of our new friend.'
(_d_) The fact that Shelley sent from Dublin a copy of the paper containing these words, and particularly called Godwin's attention to the article in which they appeared.
(_e_) The fact that during his imprisonment Mr. Finerty had the sympathy of the _Dublin Weekly Messenger_.
These are all the facts Mr. MacCarthy produces in evidence that Shelley wrote a poem no living man ever saw, no single person of any time is known to have seen. Of course the gentleman, who is so severe on Hogg's inaccuracies, blunders and contradicts himself in marshalling so slender an array of facts. For instance, after stating (p. 100) precisely and correctly that the earliest of the five advertisements of the poem appeared in the _Oxford Herald_ of 9th March, 1811, he avers a few pages later (p. 105) that this same earliest advertisement appeared in the paper of 2nd March, 1811.
How does this curiously inaccurate gentleman reason from his facts? To Mr. MacCarthy it appears indisputable that the poem must have been written and published, as the five advertisements declare it 'Just Published.' But it is no uncommon thing now, it was no rare thing eighty years since, for publishers to announce books as 'just published,' before their actual day of publication. Books have been printed and so announced, and yet at the last moment have been withheld from publication. Moreover, it would be no new thing for a literary adventurer to advertise that a work by his pen would shortly appear, without having any intention or power to fulfil the promise of the announcement. The books of the British Museum Library would be more numerous by several thousands, had authors invariably acted up to their advertisements.