For physical sports he showed no inclination.

"He passed among his school-fellows as a strange and unsocial being; for when a holiday relieved us from our tasks, and the other boys were engaged in such sports as the narrow limits of our prison-court allowed, Shelley, who entered into none of them, would pace backwards and forwards--I think I see him now--along the southern wall, indulging in various vague and undefined ideas, the chaotic elements, if I may say so, of what afterwards produced so beautiful a world." Two of Shelley's most important biographical compositions undoubtedly refer to this period of his boyhood.

The first is the passage in the Prelude to "Laon and Cythna" which describes his suffering among the unsympathetic inmates of a school:-- Thoughts of great deeds were mine, dear Friend, when first The clouds which wrap this world from youth did pass.
I do remember well the hour which burst My spirit's sleep: a fresh May-dawn it was, When I walked forth upon the glittering grass, And wept, I knew not why; until there rose From the near school-room, voices, that, alas! Were but one echo from a world of woes-- The harsh and grating strife of tyrants and of foes.
And then I clasped my hands and looked around-- -- But none was near to mock my streaming eyes, Which poured their warm drops on the sunny ground-- So without shame I spake:--"I will be wise, And just, and free, and mild, if in me lies Such power, for I grow weary to behold The selfish and the strong still tyrannize Without reproach or check." I then controlled My tears, my heart grew calm, and I was meek and bold.
And from that hour did I with earnest thought Heap knowledge from forbidden mines of lore, Yet nothing that my tyrants knew or taught I cared to learn, but from that secret store Wrought linked armour for my soul, before It might walk forth to war among mankind.
Thus power and hope were strengthened more and more Within me, till there came upon my mind A sense of loneliness, a thirst with which I pined.
The second is a fragment on friendship preserved by Hogg.

After defining that kind of passionate attachment which often precedes love in fervent natures, he proceeds: "I remember forming an attachment of this kind at school.

I cannot recall to my memory the precise epoch at which this took pace; but I imagine it must have been at the age of eleven or twelve.