Without waiting to be assured that he was the
author, and satisfying themselves with his refusal to answer when
questioned as to the authorship, they handed him his sentence of
expulsion, which had been already drawn up in due form.
About this time Shelley wrote, or commenced writing, _Queen Mab_, a poem
which he never published, although he distributed copies among his
friends. In after years he had such a low opinion of it in every
respect, that he regretted having printed it at all; and when an edition
of it was published without his consent, he applied to the Court of
Chancery for an injunction to suppress it.
Shelley's opinions in politics and theology, which he appears to have
been far more anxious to maintain than was consistent with the peace of
the household, were peculiarly obnoxious to his father, a man as
different from his son as it is possible to conceive; and his expulsion
from Oxford was soon followed by exile from his home. He went to London,
where, through his sisters, who were at school in the neighbourhood, he
made the acquaintence of Harriet West brook, whom he eloped with and
married, when he was nineteen and she sixteen years of age.
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