"Shelley and Mary eloped at 4.15 am on 28 July 1814, accompanied by Mary's step-sister Jane Clairmont. They were pursued by Mrs Godwin (Claire's mother), who caught up with them the following day at Calais, but failed to persuade them to return. On 2 August Shelley, Mary and Claire reached Paris, where they purchased this notebook. Shelley wrote up their dramatic flight from England, the stormy crossing (during which he began 'to reason upon death') and their arrival in France. Mary makes her first contribution to the journal by lightly completing a sentence: 'Mary was there. Shelley was also with me.'"
"'Everybody is in despair and every thing in confusion' writes Shelley in his last letter to Mary. He was in Pisa to discuss a new journal, The Liberal, with Leigh Hunt and Lord Byron.
Shelley had been delayed there by Hunt's personal situation (his wife Marianne had been told she did not have long to live) and by Byron's complicated affairs. He hints that Edward Williams might sail back to the Villa Magni ahead of him. Hurriedly concluding the letter, Shelley hopes that Mary was reconciled to staying at the Villa Magni, where he had never been happier, but where she had been ill and wretchedly depressed. In a PS he tells her that he has found the manuscript of his translation."
