The poet Shelley was not one who would have worried about short rations. “He took no thought,” says a biographer, “of sublunary matters”:
Dinner seems to have come less by forethought than by the operation of divine chance; and when there was no meat provided for the entertainment of casual guests the table was supplied with buns, procured by Shelley from the nearest pastry-cook. He had already abjured animal food and alcohol; and his favourite diet consisted of pulse or bread, which he ate dry with water, or made into panade.
Read More