The Cambridge History of English and American Literature in 18 Volumes (1907–21).
Volume XII. The Romantic Revival.
§ 4. The Liberal
Shortly before Shelley’s death, he and Byron had prevailed upon Leigh Hunt to leave England and come out with his family to Italy, in order to take part with the two poets in the foundation of a magazine, The Liberal. The death of Shelley was a severe blow to this undertaking; but the first number, containing Byron’s The Vision of Judgment, appeared in September, 1822; the second number included among its pages the mystery-play, Heaven and Earth, while in the third number appeared, as an anonymous work, the literary eclogue entitled The Blues, which directed a somewhat ineffective satire upon the literary coteries of London society. After the appearance of the fourth number, containing Byron’s translation of Morgante Maggiore, in July, 1823, The Liberal came to an untimely end, and the relations between Byron and Leigh Hunt, which had from the first been strained, ended in complete rupture.