The Diary of Dr. John William Polidori

[The "house" of Shelley and his party which is here mentioned is the Campagne Chapuis, or Campagne Mont Alègre, near Cologny—distant from the Villa Diodati only about 8 minutes' walk. Shelley and the two ladies had entered this house towards the end of May, prior to the actual settlement of Lord Byron in the Villa Diodati. The Shelleys, as we have more than once heard from this Diary, kept up the practice of drinking tea—a beverage always cherished by Percy Bysshe. The topics of conversation, we observe, were madness—probably following on from what Shelley had on the previous day said about his own supposed madness while at Eton; also Curran, whom Shelley had seen a little, but without any sympathy, in Dublin—and Grattan, who, so far as I am aware was not personally known to the poet.]

June 3.—Went to Pictet's on English day.

June 4.—Went about Diodati's house. Then to see Shelley, who, with Mrs. Shelley, came over. Went in the evening to a musical society of about ten members at M. Odier's; who read a very interesting memoir upon the subject of whether a physician should in any case tell a lover the health [of the lady of his affections], or anything that, from being her physician, comes to his knowledge. Afterwards had tea and politics. Saw there a Dr. Gardner, whom I carried home in the calèche. Odier invited me for every Wednesday.

Came home. Went on the lake with Shelley and Lord Byron, who quarrelled with me.

[This might seem to be the matter to which Professor Dowden in his Life of Shelley (following Moore's Life of Byron and some other authorities) thus briefly refers. "Towards Shelley the Doctor's feeling was a constantly self-vexing jealousy [I cannot say that the Diary of Polidori has up to this point borne the least trace of any such soreness]; and on one occasion, suffering from the cruel wrong of having been a loser in a sailing-match, he went so far as to send Shelley a challenge, which was received with a fit of becoming laughter. 'Recollect,' said Byron, 'that, though Shelley has some scruples about duelling, I have none and shall be at all times ready to take his place.'" Professor Dowden does not define the date when this squabble occurred; but the context in which he sets it suggests a date anterior to June 22, when Byron and Shelley started off on their week's excursion upon the Lake of Geneva. The very curt narrative of Polidori does not however indicate any sailing-match, nor any challenge, whether "sent" or verbally delivered at the moment; and perhaps it may be more reasonable to suppose that this present quarrel with Byron was a different affair altogether—an instance when Polidori happened to strike Byron's knee with an oar. I shall recur to the duelling matter farther on.]

June 5.—At 12 went to Hentsch about Diodati; thence to Shelley's. Read Tasso. Home in calèche. Dined with them in the public room: walked in the garden. Then dressed, and to Odier's, who talked with me about somnambulism. Was at last seated, and conversed with some Génevoises: so so—too fine. Quantities of English; speaking amongst themselves, arms by their sides, mouths open and eyes glowing; might as well make a tour of the Isle of Dogs. Odier gave me yesterday many articles of Bibliothèque—translated and rédigés by himself, and to-day a manuscript on somnambulism.

[After the word Bibliothèque Charlotte Polidori has put some other word, evidently intended to imitate the look of the word written by Dr. Polidori: it cannot be read. The subject of somnambulism was one which had engaged Polidori's attention at an early age: he printed in 1815 a Disputatio Medica Inauguralis de Oneirodyniâ, as a thesis for the medical degree which he then obtained in Edinburgh.]

June 6.—At 1 up—breakfasted. With Lord Byron in the calèche to Hentsch, where we got the paper making us masters of Diodati for six months to November 1 for 125 louis.

[See my remarks under June 1 as to "Necker's house," and the rent to be paid. Up to November 1 would be barely five months, not six.]

Thence to Shelley: back: dinner. To Shelley in boat: driven on shore: home. Looked over inventory and Berger's accounts. Bed.

June 7.—Up at –. Pains in my loins and languor in my bones. Breakfasted—looked over inventory.

Saw L[ord] B[yron] at dinner; wrote to my father and Shelley; went in the boat with L[ord] B[yron]; agreed with boatman for English boat. Told us Napoleon had caused him to get his children. Saw Shelley over again.

[It seems rather curious that Polidori, living so near Shelley, should now have had occasion to write to him; ought we to infer that the challenge was now at last sent? Perhaps so; and perhaps, when Polidori "saw Shelley over again," the poet laughed the whole foolish matter off.—The boatman's statement that "Napoleon had caused him to get his children" means, I suppose, that he wanted to rear children, to meet Napoleon's conscriptions for soldiers.]

June 8.—Up at 9; went to Geneva on horseback, and then to Diodati to see Shelley; back; dined; into the new boat—Shelley's,—and talked, till the ladies' brains whizzed with giddiness, about idealism. Back; rain; puffs of wind. Mistake.

June 9.—Up by 1: breakfasted. Read Lucian. Dined. Did the same: tea'd. Went to Hentsch: came home. Looked at the moon, and ordered packing-up.

June 10.—Up at 9. Got things ready for going to Diodati; settled accounts, etc. Left at 3; went to Diodati; went back to dinner, and then returned. Shelley etc. came to tea, and we sat talking till 11. My rooms are so:

June 11.—Wrote home and to Pryse Gordon. Read Lucian. Went to Shelley's; dined; Shelley in the evening with us.

June 12.—Rode to town. Subscribed to a circulating library, and went in the evening to Madame Odier. Found no one. Miss O[dier], to make time pass, played the Ranz des Vaches—plaintive and war-like. People arrived. Had a confab with Dr. O. about perpanism,9 etc. Began dancing: waltzes, cotillons, French country-dances and English ones: first time I shook my feet to French measure. Ladies all waltzed except the English: they looked on frowning. Introduced to Mrs. Slaney: invited me for next night. You ask without introduction; the girls refuse those they dislike. Till 12. Went and slept at the Balance.

June 13.—Rode home, and to town again. Went to Mrs. Slaney: a ball. Danced and played at chess. Walked home in thunder and lightning: lost my way. Went back in search of some one—fell upon the police. Slept at the Balance.

June 14.—Rode home—rode almost all day. Dined with Rossi, who came to us; shrewd, quick, manly-minded fellow; like him very much. Shelley etc. fell in in the evening.

June 15.—Up late; began my letters. Went to Shelley's. After dinner, jumping a wall my foot slipped and I strained my left ankle. Shelley etc. came in the evening; talked of my play etc., which all agreed was worth nothing. Afterwards Shelley and I had a conversation about principles,—whether man was to be thought merely an instrument.

[The accident to Polidori's ankle was related thus by Byron in a letter addressed from Ouchy to John Murray. "Dr. Polidori is not here, but at Diodati; left behind in hospital with a sprained ankle, acquired in tumbling from a wall—he can't jump." Thomas Moore, in his Life of Byron, supplies some details. "Mrs. Shelley was, after a shower of rain, walking up the hill to Diodati; when Byron, who saw her from his balcony where he was standing with Polidori, said to the latter: 'Now you who wish to be gallant ought to jump down this small height, and offer your arm.' Polidori tried to do so; but, the ground being wet, his foot slipped and he sprained his ankle. Byron helped to carry him in, and, after he was laid on the sofa, went up-stairs to fetch a pillow for him. 'Well, I did not believe you had so much feeling,' was Polidori's ungracious remark."

The play written by Polidori, which received so little commendation, was, I suppose, the Cajetan which is mentioned at an early point in the Journal. There was another named Boadicea, in prose; very poor stuff, and I suppose written at an early date. A different drama named Ximenes was afterwards published: certainly its merit—whether as a drama or as a specimen of poetic writing—is slender. The conversation between Shelley and Polidori about "principles"and "whether man was to be thought merely an instrument" appears to have some considerable analogy with a conversation to which Mary Shelley and Professor Dowden refer, and which raised in her mind a train of thought conducing to her invention of Frankenstein and his Man-monster. Mary, however, speaks of Byron (not Polidori) as the person who conversed with Shelley on that occasion. Professor Dowden, paraphrasing some remarks made by Mary, says: "One night she sat listening to a conversation between the two poets at Diodati. What was the nature, they questioned, of the principle of life? Would it ever be discovered, and the power of communicating life be acquired? Perhaps a corpse would be reanimated; galvanism had given token of such things. That night Mary lay sleepless," etc.]

June 16.—Laid up. Shelley came, and dined and slept here, with Mrs. S[helley] and Miss Clare Clairmont. Wrote another letter.

[This is the first instance in which the name of Miss Clairmont is given correctly by Polidori; but it may be presumed that he had, several days back, found out that she was not properly to be termed "Miss Godwin."]

June 17.—Went into the town; dined with Shelley etc. here. Went after dinner to a ball at Madame Odier's; where I was introduced to Princess Something and Countess Potocka, Poles, and had with them a long confab. Attempted to dance, but felt such horrid pain was forced to stop. The ghost-stories are begun by all but me.

[This date serves to rectify a small point in literary history. We all know that the party at Cologny—consisting of Byron and Polidori on the one hand, and of Shelley and Mrs. Shelley and Miss Clairmont on the other—undertook to write each of them an independent ghost-story, or story of the supernatural; the result being Byron's fragment of The Vampyre, Polidori's complete story of The Vampyre, and Mrs. Shelley's renowned Frankenstein. Shelley and Miss Clairmont proved defaulters. It used to be said that Matthew Gregory Lewis, author of The Monk, had been mixed up in the same project; but this is a mistake, for Lewis only reached the Villa Diodati towards the middle of August. Professor Dowden states as follows: "During a few days of ungenial weather which confined them to the house [by "them" Shelley and the two ladies are evidently meant, and perhaps also Byron and Polidori] some volumes of ghost-stories, Fantasmagoriana, ou Recueil d'Histoires d'Apparitions, de Spectres, Revenans, etc. (a collection translated into French from the German) fell into their hands, and its perusal probably excited and overstrained Shelley's imagination." Professor Dowden then proceeds to narrate an incident connected with Coleridge's Christabel, of which more anon; and he says that immediately after that incident Byron proposed, "We will each write a ghost-story"—a suggestion to which the others assented. It is only fair to observe that Professor Dowden's account corresponds with that which Polidori himself supplied in the proem to his tale of The Vampyre. But Polidori's Diary proves that this is not absolutely correct. The ghost-stories (prompted by the Fantasmagoriana, a poor sort of book) had already been begun by Byron, Shelley, Mrs. Shelley, and Miss Clairmont, not later than June 17, whereas the Christabel incident happened on June 18. Byron's story, as I have already said, was The Vampyre, left a fragment; Shelley's is stated to have been some tale founded on his own early experiences—nothing farther is known of it; Mrs. Shelley's was eventually Frankenstein, but, from the details which have been published as to the first conception of this work, we must assume that what she had begun by June 17 was something different: of Miss Clairmont's story no sort of record remains.

The Countess Potocka, whom Polidori mentions, was a lady belonging to the highest Polish nobility, grand-niece of Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski, who had been King of Poland up to 1798. She was daughter of Count Tyszkiewicz, and married Count Potocki, and afterwards Count Wonsowicz. Born in 1776, she lived on to 1867, when she died in Paris, a leader of society under the Second Empire. Thus she was forty years old when Polidori saw her. She wrote memoirs of her life, going up to 1820: a rather entertaining book, dealing with many important transactions, especially of the period of Napoleon I: she gives one to understand that this supreme potentate was rather susceptible to her charms, but a rival compatriot, the Countess Walewska, was then in the ascendant. I have seen reproductions from two portraits of the Countess Potocka, both of them ascribed to Angelica Kauffman: one of these shows a strikingly handsome young woman, with dark eyes of singular brilliancy and sentiment. Its date cannot be later than 1807, when the painter died, and may probably be as early as 1800.]

June 18.—My leg much worse. Shelley and party here. Mrs. S[helley] called me her brother (younger). Began my ghost-story10 after tea. Twelve o'clock, really began to talk ghostly. L[ord] B[yron] repeated some verses of Coleridge's Christabel, of the witch's breast; when silence ensued, and Shelley, suddenly shrieking and putting his hands to his head, ran out of the room with a candle. Threw water in his face, and after gave him ether. He was looking at Mrs. S[helley], and suddenly thought of a woman he had heard of who had eyes instead of nipples, which, taking hold of his mind, horrified him.—He married; and, a friend of his liking his wife, he tried all he could to induce her to love him in turn. He is surrounded by friends who feed upon him, and draw upon him as their banker. Once, having hired a house, a man wanted to make him pay more, and came trying to bully him, and at last challenged him. Shelley refused, and was knocked down; coolly said that would not gain him his object, and was knocked down again.—Slaney called.

[Some of these statements are passing strange, and most of them call for a little comment. First we hear that Mrs. Shelley called Polidori her younger brother—a designation which may have been endearing but was not accurate; for, whereas the doctor was aged 20 at this date, Mrs. Shelley was aged only 18. Next, Polidori, after tea, began his ghost-story. This, according to Mrs. Shelley, was a tale about "a skull-headed lady, who was so punished for peeping through a keyhole—what to see, I forget; something very shocking and wrong, of course." So says Mrs. Shelley: but Polidori's own statement is that the tale which he at first began was the one published under the title of Ernestus Berchtold, which contains nothing about a skull-headed lady: some details are given in my Introduction. Afterwards he took up the notion of a vampyre, when relinquished by Byron. The original story, Ernestus Berchtold, may possibly have been completed in 1816: at any rate it was completed at some time, and published in 1819, soon after The Vampyre. Then comes the incident (first published in my edition of Shelley's poems in 1870) of Byron repeating some lines from Christabel, and Shelley, who mixed them up with some fantastic idea already present to his mind, decamping with a shriek. The lines from Christabel are these—

"Then drawing in her breath aloud,Like one that shuddered, she unboundThe cincture from beneath her breast:Her silken robe and inner vestDropped to her feet, and full in viewBehold! her bosom and half her side,Hideous, deformed, and pale of hue—A sight to dream of, not to tell!And she is to sleep by Christabel!"

From this incident Polidori proceeds to three statements regarding occurrences in Shelley's life; it may be presumed that he had heard them from the poet in the course of this same evening. "A friend of his liking his wife, he tried all he could to induce her to love him in turn." Nothing of this sort appears in the authenticated facts of Shelley's life. It is certain that, very soon after he had married Harriet Westbrook in 1811, he saw reason for thinking that his friend Hogg "liked his wife," both of them being then in York; but, so far from "trying all he could to induce her to love him in turn," he at once took her away from York to Keswick, and he addressed letters of grave remonstrance and sad reproach to Hogg, and then for a time broke off all intercourse with him. The only other matter one knows of at all relevant to this issue is that Shelley alleged that afterwards a certain Major Ryan carried on an intrigue with Harriet. He blamed and resented her imputed frailty, and put it forward as a principal motive for his separating from her. It is certainly possible that, after the separation, he told Harriet that she might as well "make the best of a bad job," and adhere to Ryan, since she would not adhere to her wedded husband: but no indication of any such advice on his part appears anywhere else. Be it understood that I do not at all affirm that this suspicion or statement of Shelley's about Harriet and Ryan was correct. I doubt it extremely, though not venturing summarily to reject it. The next point is that Shelley was "surrounded by friends who feed upon him, and draw upon him as their banker." This probably glances at Godwin, and perhaps also at Charles Clairmont, the brother of Clare. Thomas Love Peacock may likewise be in question: not Leigh Hunt, for, though the cap might have fitted him in and after the year 1817, it did not so in the present year 1816, since Hunt was as yet all but unknown to our poet. Last comes the funny statement about a hectoring landlord who twice knocked down the non-duelling author of Queen Mab. It is difficult to guess what this allegation may refer to. Shelley had by this time had several landlords in different parts of the United Kingdom; and quite possibly some of them thought his rent unduly low, or more especially his quarterly or other instalments irregularly paid, but who can have been the landlord who took the law so decisively into his own hands, and found so meekly unresisting a tenant, I have no idea. There was an odd incident on January 19, 1812, when Shelley, then living at Keswick, was (or was said to have been) struck down senseless on the threshold of his door—seemingly by a couple of robbers. On that occasion, however, his landlord, Mr. Dare, appeared in the character of a guardian angel: so we must dismiss any notion that this incident, the one which in some of its features seems to come nearest the mark, is that which Shelley so ingenuously imparted to Polidori.]

June 19.—Leg worse; began my ghost-story. Mr. S[helley?] etc. forth here. Bonstetten and Rossi called. B[onstetten] told me a story of the religious feuds in Appenzel; a civil war between Catholics and Protestants. Battle arranged; chief advances; calls the other. Calls himself and other fools, for battles will not persuade of his being wrong. Other agreed, and persuaded them to take the boundary rivulet; they did. Bed at 3 as usual.

June 20.—My leg kept me at home. Shelley etc. here.

June 21.—Same.

June 22.—L[ord] B[yron] and Shelley went to Vevay; Mrs. S[helley] and Miss Clare Clairmont to town. Went to Rossi's—had tired his patience. Called on Odier; Miss reading Byron.

[The expedition of Byron and Shelley to Vevay was that same Lake-voyage which forms so prominent an incident in their Swiss experiences. Their starting upon this expedition had hitherto been dated June 23. Professor Dowden has expressed a doubt whether June 22 would not be the correct date, and here we find that so it is.]

June 23.—Went to town; apologized to Rossi. Called on Dr. Slaney etc. Walked to Mrs. Shelley. Pictet, Odier, Slaney, dined with me. Went down to Mrs. S[helley?] for the evening. Odier mentioned the cases of two gentlemen who, on taking the nitrate of silver, some time after had a blacker face. Pictet confirmed it.

June 24.—Up at 12. Dined down with Mrs. S[helley] and Miss C[lare] C[lairmont].

[The dates hereabouts become somewhat embarrassing. For the day which I am calling June 24 Polidori repeats June 23; and he continues with the like sequence of days up to June 29, when, as he notes, he "found Lord Byron and Shelley returned." It seems to be an established fact that the day when Shelley got back to Montalègre was July 1: he has stated so, and a note to the Letters of Lord Byron states the same. Thus Polidori seems to have dropped two days. One is accounted for by substituting June 24 for June 23; and I shall call the next day June 26, though uncertain as to where the second error occurs.]

June 26.—Up. Mounted on horseback: went to town. Saw Mrs. Shelley: dined. To Dr. Rossi's party of physicians: after at Mrs. S[helley's?].

June 27.—Up at Mrs. Shelley's: dined. No calèche arrived: walked to G[eneva]. No horses: ordered saddle-horse. Walked to Rossi's—gone. Went to the gate: found him. Obliged to break off the appointment. Went to Odier's. Met with Mr. –, a friend of Lord Byron's father. Invited me to his house: been a long time on the Continent. Music, ranz des vaches, beautiful. Rode two hours; went to Mrs. S[helley]; Miss C[lairmont] talked of a soliloquy.

[This last phrase is not clear: does it mean that Miss Clairmont talked in a soliloquy—talked to herself, in such a way as to excite observation?]

June 28.—All day at Mrs. S[helley's].

June 29.—Up at 1; studied; down at Mrs. S[helley's].

June 30.—Same.

July 1.—Went in calèche to town with Mrs. S[helley] and C[lare] for a ride, and to mass (which we did not go to, being begun). Dined at 1. Went to town to Rossi. Introduced to Marchese Saporati; together to Mr. Saladin of Vaugeron, Countess Breuss, Calpnafur; and then to a party of ladies.

[The word which I give as Calpnafur is dubious in Charlotte Polidori's transcript: it is evidently one of those words as to which she felt uncertain, and she wrote it as near to Dr. Polidori's script as she could manage. The other three names—Saporati, Saladin, and Breuss—are not elucidated in any book I have consulted. Perhaps Saporati ought to be Saporiti—see p. 149. There were two Saladins of some note in France in the days of the Revolution and Empire—one of them lived on to 1832; but I can scarcely think that this Saladin in Geneva was of the same race. He may be the "Syndic Saladin" mentioned farther on.]

Found Lord Byron and Shelley returned.

July 2.—Rain all day. In the evening to Mrs. S[helley].

September 5.—Not written my Journal till now through neglect and dissipation. Had a long explanation with S[helley] and L[ord] B[yron] about my conduct to L[ord] B[yron]; threatened to shoot S[helley] one day on the water. Horses been a subject of quarrel twice, Berger having accused me of laming one.

[Before this date, September 5, Shelley, with Mary and Miss Clairmont, had finally left the neighbourhood of Geneva; they started on August 29 upon their return journey to England. The statement that Polidori "threatened to shoot Shelley one day on the water" brings us back again to that question, of which I spoke under the date of June 4, about some hare-brained quarrel with Shelley leading to a challenge for a duel. The natural inference from the position which this entry occupies in Polidori's Diary certainly is that the threat to Shelley occurred at some date between July 2 and August 28—not at the earlier date of June 4; and so I presume it more probably did. We find also that Polidori's conduct in relation to Byron was considered not to be correct; and this formed the subject of "a long explanation" not only with Byron himself but likewise with Shelley.]

L[ord] B[yron] went to town in pursuit of thieves who came to steal the anchors after having stolen my sail. Was refused permission to go out. I went to the Syndic Saladin, and told him I begged his pardon for our servants, who must have said something insulting, or else he could not have refused permission to leave the port. Thieves attempted to break into the house.