Byron and Shelley and the Bar Bet

One of the things that always annoyed Shelley about Byron was the fact that he never lost a bar bet—and a very unique kind of bar bet at that.  Byron would walk into a pub full of strangers and declare: “I can identify any piece of pottery in the house.  Blindfolded.  If I lose, I pay you a thousand pounds. If I win, I drink for free until you run out of liquor or I pass out, whichever comes first.”  It was a bet he always won, and it was a tribute to his lifestyle that passing out rarely came first.

“This is Mrs. Macready’s chamber pot,” he would announce, his eyes covered with a black kerchief. “This is the urn that your grandmother bought from an old Welsh tinker when she was twenty,” he would say, the moment it was handed to him. “This is the stein that the bartender always give that old miser at the end of the bar, the one who never leaves him any tips,” he would declare. “He thinks it’s his special stein, and it is; it’s special because the bartender always spits in it whenever he pours the old Scrooge a beer.”

“Teach me how to Do that,” Shelley would plead. But Byron would laugh and say: “You?  You?  Oh, Shelley—you couldn’t tell how many fingers a woman had if you kissed her hand.”

It was meant to hurt, and it did. It throbbed in Shelley’s soul like a stinger from a dying bumblebee, until one day Shelley decided that he was going to stump his overbearing friend by presenting him with a piece of pottery that he could not identify.

Now Byron despised the Navy—had no truck with it—couldn’t tell a yacht from a frigate, and had little use for anything nautical, except the occasional lonely sailor. So Shelley approached a friend of his father’s, an old Admiral, and after explaining his mission, asked to procure the meanest cuspidor from the lowest garbage scow in the fleet.

“I will go you one better,” said the Admiral, and produced an ordinary-looking porcelain vase with flowers painted on it.  “Do you know how many warships this has christened?”

“Since it is still in one Piece,” Shelley said, “I would have to say None.”

“On the contrary,” said the Admiral “It has christened over eleven hundred ships of the line.”

“But how is that Possible?”  Shelley asked.

“Because it is made of bronze and painted to look like a vase,” the Admiral explained. “And the bronze was part of the Golden Hind, Drake’s ship, when it circumnavigated the globe. We sailors are a superstitious lot, and this vase is one of our greatest secrets. Before every public ceremony, there is a private one conducted by all serving members of the Admiralty, where this bronze vase is filled with sea water from the Channel which is then splashed on the new ship’s prow. Your friend will never guess what it is.”

Thanking the Admiral profusely, Shelley took the vase, and bided his time. A week later, when Byron made his usual wager in a local bar, Shelley paid the bartender to announce that one of his relatives had just the thing for him to identify, and he would send a messenger to get it. Byron agreed and put on his blindfold, whereupon Shelley ran home, procured the vase, ran back to the bar, and handed it to the bartender.

“Here you go, sir,” the bartender declared, passing it on to Byron.

Byron held the object in front of his blindfolded eyes for the longest ten seconds of Shelley’s life. Then he raised it up with his right hand, gestured to it with his left, and declaimed: “Is this the vase that launched a thousand ships?”

Copyright 2016 Matthew J Wells

Byron And Shelley And The Pantomime Festival

The town of Chidnight in Surrey was word-renowned for its annual festival of pantomimes. Every April, the kings and queens of dumb show descended on the tiny town for its fortnight festival, as did aficionados of the art form like Byron and Shelley.

This particular year, a company of Venetian mimes were scheduled to present their breakthrough triumph Il Stordimento (The Daze), in which a husband and wife are hypnotized into reversing their household roles, which wreaks havoc with their marriage as well as confusing each one’s secret lover.

“I shall be Watching for their Technique,” Shelley declared, as he read the program’s summary of lazzi.

“I shall be watching for the intrigue,” Byron replied. “The actors playing the husband and wife are married in real life, and rumor has it that the actor playing the wife’s lover has also extended his role into reality.”

Byron’s attention was rewarded when, halfway through the show, the wife’s lover sent the husband into a pratfall that was more malicious than mirthful, and the husband responded with an aria of operatic profanity that shocked every dumb show purist in the audience, many of whom became enraged and began shouting at the actors, none of whom remained inarticulate for very long. Within moments, the shouting turned into fighting, as the outnumbered actors of Il Stordimento defended themselves against the outraged Chidnight audience.

Shelley (being philosophical) and Byron (being practical) managed to escape the pandemonium with only minor injuries, and quickly repaired to a nearby tavern.

“Jesus, The Daze that we have seen!” Shelley declared, over mugs of sherry sack.

“Yes, Master Shelly,” Byron replied. “We have heard the mimes at Chidnight.”

Copyright 2016 by Matthew J Wells

Byron and Shelley and the Hello Dolly Revival

Two weeks after Shelley was hired as casting director for the Hello Dolly revival, he was pulling his hair out in frustration. “I cannot get Bette Midler to Commit to more than one Day a Week!” he complained to Byron. “She refuses to perform on any Other day but Tuesday. Which means I have to find another Name Star for all the other Shows—but none of them can commit to more than one day either.”

“Who do you have lined up?” Byron asked.

“Queen Latifah on Wednesdays, because she can do both Shows; Bernadette Peters on Saturdays, for the same Reason; and then Reba McEntire on Thursdays, Imelda Staunton on Fridays, and Ru Paul on Sundays.”

“Problem solved, then,” Byron pointed out.

“Problem just begun!” Shelley whined. “Eight shows, with six Different stars? How in the World am I going to Market this to theatergoers?”

“Simple,” said Byron. “Another day, another Dolly.”

Copyright 2016 Matthew J Wells

Byron and Shelley and the Parish Priest

 

 

“Priests are all hypocrites,” Shelley declared one day.  

“And how would you know that,” Byron replied, “since you never go to Mass?”  Which was the truth. As a profound atheist, Shelley was in the habit of avoiding church services, while as a profound ironist, Byron attended as many as possible. 

“I speak from personal Experience,” Shelley explained. “When I was young, our parish pastor was Meek, modest, self-effacing, and a gentle Friend to everyone in the community. But the moment he stepped up to the Pulpit, he became  a completely different person. A vain, conceited, self-loving Narcissist. A pompous Ass who only spoke about Himself.” 

“That is not surprising,” Byron said with a shrug. 

“Not surprising!” Shelley cried. “He turned into a completely Different person!” 

“Of course he did,” Byron said. “Doesn’t every priest have an altar ego?”

 

 

 

Copyright 2016 Matthew J Wells

Byron and Shelley and the Philosophical Treatise

 

“And what are you working on now?” Byron asked, as he walked in on Shelley to find him writing furiously, and then crossing out what he had just penned.  

“It is a philosophical Treatise of the highest Order,” Shelley declared, “which demonstrates the commensurate Causal Agency between reading David Hume’s Treatise on Human Nature and his Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals, and engaging in tying, binding, or restraining a  sexual partner for the purposes of erotic Stimulation. I just can’t think of a title.” 

“That’s easy,” said Byron. “Call it Of Hume And Bondage.” 

 

 Copyright 2016 Matthew J Wells

Byron The Magician

 

 

“I am teaching myself to become a magician,” Byron announced. 

“Indeed,” replied Shelley.  “And how are you Doing that?”   

“Observe!” Byron declared. 

He produced a white rat, and three brightly colored strings of green, red, and blue. 

“This is my rat; I call him Keats.  I have educated Keats so that the ingestion of each string triggers a previously-trained habit,” Byron explained.  “For instance—the dancing habit!” he cried, and fed Keats the green string, whereupon the rat immediately began to do an Irish jig.   

When Byron pulled the green string out, he cried: “The somersault habit!” and fed Keats the red string, at which point the rat began to do forwards and backwards somersaults across the floor.   

“And the sitting habit!” Byron said, pulling the red string out and feeding Keats the blue string.  The rat gobbled up the string and immediately sat on its haunches and lowered its head into its forepaws like a miniature human lost in thought. 

“That is all quite Remarkable in its own Way,” Shelley admitted, “but these so-called Habits of yours are not Magic.  What this tiny Creature is doing is simply the end Result of Discipline and Practice.  That does not make you a Magician.” 

“Of course I’m a magician,” Byron declared, grabbing the end of the blue thread sticking out of Keats’ mouth.  “Watch me pull a habit out of my rat.”

Copyright 2015 Matthew J Wells

Byron and Shelley and the Czechoslovakian Seduction

While dedicated to poetry as an avocation, Shelley was not above performing the occasional clandestine service for the British government, and often enlisted the equally impecunious Byron as an agent provocateur.   

During one of these missions, Shelley was tasked with obtaining information about Czechoslovakia’s defenses, and ordered Byron to use his considerable charms to obtain that information by seducing Queen Caroline Augusta of that country.   

Byron supplied daily coded reports of his progress via carrier pigeon for two weeks, but after promising that the defense plans would be delivered via the next day’s message, he vanished from Prague and the reports broke off.   

Shelley spent the next three days in an agony of speculation, and finally risked delivering a message to a pre-arranged safe house through a local double agent.   

The message read: “Byron—please report Status.  Worried that Mission to Seduce Queen has been Compromised.”   

The next day a carrier pigeon brought Byron’s scribbled reply: “Trust me—the male is in the Czech.”

 

Copyright 2015 Matthew J Wells

Byron And Shelley At The Hippocrates Club

 

 

Whenever he was visiting London, Byron would stay at the Hippocrates Club on Dean Street in Soho—a private doctors-only club of which Byron had been made an honorary member thanks to his contributions into the causes and cures of clubfoot. 

The first time Shelley met him there for dinner, Byron gave him the grand tour, showing him, among other rooms, the immense library with its priceless historical collection of ancient medical manuscripts, the Anatomy Room with its articulated skeletons and plaster models of the human circulatory system, and the Hall of Cerebella, in which were displayed the preserved brains of everything from dormice to dolphins. 

“Shall we have a drink before dinner?” Byron asked rhetorically, and led Shelley into a high-ceilinged room, with a bar at one end, whose four walls were covered with shelves that groaned under the weight of hundreds of specimen jars.  Upon examining the contents of these jars, Shelley was shocked to perceive that they contained perfectly-preserved examples of the male reproductive organs of every animal species on earth, including humans. 

“Good Lord!”  he exclaimed.  “This room is completely filled with specimens of Male Genitalia!” 

“Of course it is,” Byron explained.  “This is the Members Lounge.” 

 

 

Copyright 2014 Matthew J Wells

Byron and Shelley and Buddhism

When Byron decided to become a Buddhist, he gave up all but five shirts, four pair of pants, three jackets, two pair of shoes, and one household appliance, a state of the art vacuum cleaner. 

One afternoon, when Shelley was visiting Byron’s Spartan accommodations, he noticed that while the floors of every room were immaculate, each and every corner was grimy with dust and grit. 

”I don’t Understand,” Shelley said. 

Byron, who was seated in the lotus position, replied in a low monotone: “Of course you don’t; it is the common lot of mankind.” 

“I’m not talking about Mankind, I’m talking about your Living Room,” Shelley cried.  “You obviously vacuum the Floors, but what I don’t Understand is, when you’re doing it, why don’t you vacuum the Corners as well?”

"Because," said Byron sadly, "I don't have any attachments."

 

Byron and Shelley at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival

While attending the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Byron and Shelley obtained lodgings from a local lawyer who had two beautiful daughters named Faith and Hope.  Because of the thickness of their accents, Shelley thought of them as Feth and Hawp, and while Feth was the prettier of the two, she did not hesitate to express a flood of aggressively vocal opinions about everything from the weather to politics, and spoke so constantly that it would have taken a medical examination to determine exactly how she managed to breathe.  Shelley much preferred Hawp, a demure and respectful creature who had little to say about anything at all while in her sister’s presence, but she was smitten with Byron.  

On their second night in town, Shelley took Feth to see a comedy from England, during which she continually whispered comments, questions and opinions about the acting.  Meanwhile, Byron took Hawp out to dinner, and the moment they sat down, Byron found himself in the company of a woman who was just as vocal, twice as opinionated, and ten times as discontented as her sister.  His sole contribution to her unceasing flow of invective and dissatisfaction was the occasional grunt of sympathy and the infrequent interjection of the words “Oh really?”  “Do you now?” and “Is that so?” 

At the end of the evening, having bid their respective dates good night, the two men retired to their chambers in a state of wearisome distemper. 

“How was your evening?” Byron asked. 

“Oh it was Intolerable,” Shelley declared.  “The Creature chattered away throughout the entire Performance.  She is a sad Paradox, Byron—her opinions are as Odious as her features are Beautiful.  And how was your dinner with Hawp?”

 

Byron shook his head sadly. “It was a date worse than Feth,” he replied.



Copyright 2014 Matthew J Wells

Byron and Shelley and the Missolonghi Angelos

When Byron was working part-time as a reporter for the Missolonghi Angelos, he would invariably report on events that occurred in other countries by sifting through over a dozen reports from foreign news agencies (AP, UPI, Bloomberg, Dow Jones, and others) and combining them into a weekly column entitled News The Rest Of The World Thinks Is Important.  It was a masterpiece of summation, written with that charming air of wit and derision for which Byron was so well-renowned.

It so happened that, after appearing in the first week of February, the column was absent from the Angelos for the next three weeks, by the end of which time the Angelos editors were inundated by outraged subscribers demanding to know why the column had been discontinued.

“But it has not been discontinued,” Byron confessed to Shelley one night at the beginning of March.  “The plain truth is that I can no longer compose it.  I put pen to paper and the words do not come.”

“But how is that possible,” Shelley asked, “when you have such a Gift for impromptu Cleverness?” 

“Alas,” Byron replied, “my gift is of a conversational nature.  Put me in a room with a crowd of strangers and I am the verbal light that shines on all of ‘em.  Force me to speak one-on-one with a single soul and my wit dries up till I am dim.”

“And what does that have to do with your Column?” Shelley asked.

“The Angelos has been feeling the financial pinch of late,” Byron explained, “so it has not only cut back on its staff and production, it has additionally cancelled all but one of its subscriptions to foreign news agencies.  Where once I had over a dozen voices to summarize, I now have only one, originating from England of all places, and try as I might, the words will not come when I attempt to compose an article based on its contents.”

“You mean?” Shelley asked.

 

“Yes,” said Byron sadly.  “I have Reuters block.”




Copyright 2014 Matthew J Wells

Byron and Shelley and the Performance of Manfred

After completing his play Manfred, Byron arranged for an Italian promoter to perform a benefit staging of the final draft, in order to pay off the mounting debts of his European exile.  Ticket sales were sluggish until Byron announced that he himself would perform the title role, and within two days, the performance had sold out. 

Shelley, who had seen Byron act before and had also read the manuscript in draft form, sat near the exit.  During the first act, his wandering attention was drawn to a woman in blue who was seated on the aisle near the stage and who appeared to be in a state of nervous anticipation, for as the act progressed, she was constantly checking her program.  The act had barely ended when she rose from her seat and rushed through a side door near the front of the theatre that led to the backstage area. 

When the second act began, she had not returned to her seat, and Shelley decided that she had left because she had been bored by the play.  It was an opinion that went unchallenged until halfway through the first scene, which took place in a cottage in the Bernese Alps.   Byron, as Manfred, was talking to a character called the Chamois Hunter, when suddenly a local baker, famed for the sweetness and lightness of his pastries, entered the scene from stage right carrying a tray of his choicest and most expensive creations.  Byron and the actor playing the Chamois Hunter broke off their dialogue to praise the baker’s wares, and Shelley deduced that this was some clever theatrical version of a program advertisement, when, to his astonishment, the lady in blue entered from stage left.  Byron kissed her cheek, introduced her to the Chamois Hunter, and presented her to the local baker with the clearly audible words: “Your choice, my dear.” 

“My thanks, my dear,” the woman replied, and after examining the baker’s pastries, pointed to a large chocolate croissant, whereupon Byron plucked it out and handed it to her.  Byron then shook the baker’s hand, waved him offstage, and escorted the woman in blue to an upstage seat where, for the rest of the scene, she ate her croissant. 

Absolutely bewildered by these events, Shelley went back to Byron’s dressing room during the second-act intermission to confess his befuddlement. 

“And how are you liking the performance?” Byron asked when he saw his friend. 

“I like it immensely,” Shelley lied, and then asked, “But what was that Business with the baker and the woman in blue during the cottage scene?” 

“Ah, that,” said Byron with a hint of regret in his voice.   “The local promoter who agreed to finance the entire cost of tonight’s performance did so with one condition.  His mistress, it seems, has set her heart upon a career as an actress; she is the woman in blue who appeared during the cottage scene.  The promoter introduced me to her a week ago.  ‘I will finance your production,’ said he, ‘if you will promise to do one thing for me.’” 

“You mean?” asked Shelley. 

“Yes,” Byron said ruefully.  “I had to promise that I would give his mistress a roll in the play.”

Copyright 2014 Matthew J Wells

Byron and Shelley and the Man from the Foreign Office

During Byron’s days in the war for Greek Independence, while he was planning an attack on the Turkish-held fortress of Lepanto, Shelley sailed to join him at Missolonghi. On the boat with him was a functionary from the British Foreign office, a little whisper of a man named Burn, who revealed to Shelley in the course of a drunken conversation that he was not only a spy, but was carrying secret papers to Byron which would help the Greek cause. “But you must not breathe a word of this to anyone,” Burn declared.

Shelley quite naturally agreed, and was more than a little amused when Burn proceeded to act so secretive and mysterious over the next two days that everyone on board knew that he was a confidential agent of some sort. He became a secret figure of fun for everyone; whenever he made an appearance in the dining room or along the rails, a passenger would raise his hands in wide eyed shock and declare “Oh Mr. Burn, I hope you don’t think that I was SPYING on you,” or a man in a deck chair would pull his blanket up around his chin and announce, “Your pardon, sir, for not greeting you immediately; I was UNDERCOVER.”

Many such verbal manifestations of middle-class hilarity assaulted poor Burn for the duration of his sea voyage, and by the time the ship anchored on the coast of Greece he had become as introverted as a turtle and suspicious as a criminal, leaving Shelley the task of making travel arrangements to get the two men to Byron without encountering the ever-present Turkish army.

After a midnight ride through the mountains, the two men reached the village where Byron was planning his assault, and Burn immediately introduced himself and handed Byron a packet of sealed letters. The poet scrutinized the documents intently, then suddenly took Burn by the hand, dragged him into his bedchambers, and slammed the door behind them. After a few moments of silence, during which Shelley pondered the meaning behind Byron’s abrupt departure, there came from behind the bedroom door a series of low moans, followed by a loud groan and the sound of something heavy being thrown to the floor. The groans increased in frequency, and were succeeded by high-pitched yelps of such intensity that Shelley was reminded of a scene of exquisite torture he had witnessed once as a school boy at Eaton. Then the yelps ended abruptly in a final coloratura, a long “O” which rose and fell like the death of an opera tenor, after which the door to the bedroom opened and a very disheveled Byron re-entered the room.

“My God, man,” said Shelley. “What were you Doing in there?”

“Only what I was ordered to do,” Byron replied.

“Ah,” said Shelley. “So you were ordered to torture the unfortunate messenger, then.”

“On the contrary,” said Byron, running a hand through his hair. “I was ordered to have wild passionate sex with him.”

“Good God, man," said Shelley with alarm. "Is this typical British Foreign Office Procedure?”

“It is in this case,” said Byron ruefully. He snatched up the letters and held them out to Shelley. “See? It’s right there at the bottom. Big block letters. PLEASE BURN AFTER READING.”

Byron and Shelley and the Teenagers

Forced by circumstance to take teaching positions at a co-educational private school for what was at the time referred to as “junior high students”, Byron and Shelley found themselves subjected to the usual indignities of the modern education system. Not only were they required to teach English Literature, they were also assigned a physical education class, as well as recess duty.

Their separate reactions to these assignments could not be a more perceptive illustration of each poet’s character. Byron, whose club foot was more of a challenge than a handicap, threw himself into his physical education class and despised recess; while Shelley, who could not hold a ball, a bat or a glove for more than thirty seconds without dropping it, hated Phys Ed but found the insanity of recess to be an endless source of social and philosophical fascination.

“It is Society in miniature,” he said to Byron.

“It is a chaos of hormones,” Byron replied with disgust.

“And what is Society but the regimentation of hormones?” cried Shelley. “It is here that the Rules of Accepted Behavior are first apprehended, albeit dimly, by a mob of barely-sentient adolescents. Perceive the manner in which the boys run in packs. Observe the fact that the girls hunt in pairs, one beautiful and one plain.”

“Fascinating,” said Byron sarcastically.

“But it is, Byron,” said Shelley, with the enthusiasm he always displayed towards a really fine intellectual conceit. “Take that boy over there -- the one looking over his shoulder -- do you see him?”

“Mark, isn’t it?”

“Mark, Martin, Matthias -- what do Names matter? Watch him. I predict that within the next five minutes he will contrive to approach that knot of girls by the swings.”

“And you know this because?”

“He has a Crush on one of them. Observe.”

Byron complied with ill grace, but sure enough, less than a minute after Shelley had spoken, the boy Martin or Mark or Matthias sauntered towards the swings with his mates, and walking up to one of the girls, he firmly put his hands on her shoulders and moved her to one side before walking past her without so much as a word.

“Did you see that?” Shelley cried, pointing. “He does it all the time! The girl and he can be the only children in the yard, and he will still find an excuse to go up to her and push her out of the way. And all because he feels an indescribable Affection for her! Isn’t that remarkable?”

“Not very,” said Byron. “You always herd the one you love.”