Imatges de pàgina
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Published in the 1817 volume. Lord Houghton states that this sonnet was the means of introducing Keats to Mr. Leigh Hunt's society. Mr. Cowden Clarke had brought some of his young friend's verses and read them aloud. Mr. Horace Smith, who happened to be there, was struck with the last six lines, especially the penultimate, saying "what a well condensed expression!" and Keats was shortly after introduced to the literary circle.' This would appear to fix the date as not later than the summer of 1815.

How many bards gild the lapses of time!

A few of them have ever been the food Of my delighted fancy, I could brood Over their beauties, earthly, or sublime : And often, when I sit me down to rhyme, These will in throngs before my mind intrude:

But no confusion, no disturbance rude Do they occasion; 't is a pleasing chime. So the unnumber'd sounds that evening store;

The songs of birds the whisp'ring of

the leaves

The voice of waters- - the great bell that heaves

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KEEN, fitful gusts are whisp'ring here and there

Among the bushes half leafless, and dry; The stars look very cold about the sky, And I have many miles on foot to fare. Yet feel I little of the cool bleak air,

Or of the dead leaves rustling drearily, Or of those silver lamps that burn on high,

Or of the distance from home's pleasant lair:

For I am brimful of the friendliness

That in a little cottage I have found; Of fair-hair'd Milton's eloquent distress, And all his love for gentle Lycid drown'd; Of lovely Laura in her light green dress, And faithful Petrarch gloriously crown'd.

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Given by Lord Houghton in Life, Letters and Literary Remains, who comments as follows: His sympathies were very much on the side of the revolutionary Giant, who "undertook for to repair" the "realms and nations run awry," and to suppress "tyrants that make men subject to their law," "and lordings curbe that commons over-aw,' ," while he grudged the legitimate victory, as he rejected the conservative philosophy, of the "righteous Artegall and his comrade, the fierce defender of privilege and order. And he expressed in this ex post facto prophecy, his conviction of the

ultimate triumph of freedom and equality by the power of transmitted knowledge.' No date is assigned, and the verse may as well be placed in the early period of Keats's acquaintance with Spenser and friendship with Leigh Hunt.

IN after-time, a sage of mickle lore Yclep'd Typographus, the Giant took, And did refit his limbs as heretofore, And made him read in many a learned book,

> ON FIRST LOOKING INTO CHAPMAN'S HOMER

L

It was Charles Cowden Clarke who was with Keats when the friends made the acquaintance of this translation of Homer by the Elizabethan poet. The two young men had sat up nearly all one night in the summer of 1815 in Clarke's lodging, reading from a folio volume of the book which they had borrowed. Keats left for his own lodgings at dawn, and when Clarke came down to breakfast the next morn

And into many a lively legend look;
Thereby in goodly themes so training ing, he found this sonnet which Keats had

him,

That all his brutishness he quite forsook,

When, meeting Artegall and Talus grim, The one he struck stone-blind, the other's eyes wox dim.

ON LEAVING

SOME FRIENDS AT AN EARLY HOUR

Written, as Clarke intimates, in connection with Keats's visits to Leigh Hunt in the Vale of Health. Published in the 1817 volume.

GIVE me a golden pen, and let me lean On heap'd-up flowers, in regions clear and far;

Bring me a tablet whiter than a star, Or hand of hymning angel, when 't is seen The silver strings of heavenly harp atween: And let there glide by many a pearly

car,

Pink robes, and wavy hair, and diamond jar,

And half-discover'd wings, and glances keen.

The while let music wander round my ears, And as it reaches each delicious ending,

Let me write down a line of glorious tone, And full of many wonders of the spheres: For what a height my spirit is contending!

'Tis not content so soon to be alone.

sent him.

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self with Keats: 'Keats and I, though about
the same age, and both inclined to literature,
were in many respects as different as two in-
dividuals could be. He enjoyed good health -
a fine flow of animal spirits was fond of
company - could amuse himself admirably
with the frivolities of life-and had great
confidence in himself. I, on the other hand,
was languid and melancholy — fond of repose
-thoughtful beyond my years - and diffi-
dent to the last degree.' The epistle is dated
November, 1815, in the volume of 1817, where
it is the first of a group of three epistles with
the motto from Browne's Britannia's Pas-
torals:

Among the rest a shepher 1 (though but young
Yet hartned to his pipe) with all the skill
His few yeeres could, began to fit his quill.

SWEET are the pleasures that to verse belong,

And doubly sweet a brotherhood in song; Nor can remembrance, Mathew! bring to view

A fate more pleasing, a delight more true Than that in which the brother Poets joy'd, Who, with combinèd powers, their wit employ'd

To raise a trophy to the drama's muses. The thought of this great partnership diffuses

Over the genius-loving heart, a feeling Of all that's high, and great, and good, and healing.

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Too partial friend! fain would I follow thee

Past each horizon of fine poesy; Fain would I echo back each pleasant note As o'er Sicilian seas, clear anthems float 'Mong the light skimming gondolas far parted,

Just when the sun his farewell beam has darted

But 't is impossible; far different cares
Beckon me sternly from soft Lydian airs,'
And hold my faculties so long in thrall,
That I am oft in doubt whether at all
I shall again see Phœbus in the morning:
Dr flush'd Aurora in the roseate dawning!

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HADST thou liv'd in days of old,
O what wonders had been told

Of thy lively countenance,

And thy humid eyes that dance
In the midst of their own brightness;
In the very fane of lightness.
Over which thine eyebrows, leaning,
Picture out each lovely meaning:
In a dainty bend they lie,
Like to streaks across the sky,
Or the feathers from a crow,
Fallen on a bed of snow.
Of thy dark hair, that extends
Into many graceful bends:
As the leaves of Hellebore
Turn to whence they sprung before.
And behind each ample curl

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