to me and tell me that you are well or thereabouts, or by the holy Beaucœur, which I suppose is the Virgin Mary, or the repented Magdalen (beautiful name, that Magdalen), I'll take to my Wings and fly away to anywhere but old or Nova Scotia

-I wish I had a little innocent bit of Metaphysic in my head, to criss-cross the letter: but you know a favourite tune is hardest to be remembered when one wants it most and you, I know, have long ere this taken it for granted that I never have any speculations without associating you in them, where they are of a pleasant nature, and you know enough of me to tell the places where I haunt most, so that if you think for five minutes after having read this, you will find it a long letter, and see written in the Air above you,

Your most affectionate friend

JOHN KEATS. Remember me to all. Tom's remembrances to you.

42. TO BENJAMIN ROBERT HAYDON Teignmouth, Saturday Morn [March 21, 1818]. MY DEAR HAYDON- In sooth, I hope you are not too sanguine about that seal 83

in sooth I hope it is not Brumidgeum in double sooth I hope it is his—and in triple sooth I hope I shall have an impression. Such a piece of intelligence came doubly welcome to me while in your own County and in your own hand not but I have blown up the said County for its urinal qualifications — the six first days I was here it did nothing but rain; and at that time having to write to a friend I gave Devonshire a good blowing up—it has been fine for almost three days, and I was coming round a bit; but to-day it rains again with me the County is yet upon its

How does the work go on? I should like to bring out my 'Dentatus '84 at the time your Epic makes its appearance. I expect to have my Mind soon clear for something new. Tom has been much worse: but is now getting better. his remembrances to you. I think of seeing the Dart and Plymouth-but I don't know. It has as yet been a Mystery to me how and where Wordsworth went. I can't help thinking he has returned to his Shell with his beautiful Wife and his enchanting Sister. It is a great Pity that People should by associating themselves with the finest things, spoil them. Hunt has damned Hampstead and masks and sonnets and Italian tales. Wordsworth has damned the lakes Milman has damned the old drama - West has damned wholesale. Peacock has damned satire - Ollier has damn'd Music - Hazlitt has damned the bigoted and the blue-stockinged; how durst the Man? he is your only good damner, and if ever I am damn'd damn me if I should n't like him to damn me. It will not be long ere I see you, but I thought I would just give you a line out of Devon.

my 4th Book to Town all in good time for you - especially after the late unfortunate chance.

I did not however for my own sake delay finishing the copy which was done a few days after my arrival here. I send it off to-day, and will tell you in a Postscript at what time to send for it from the Bull and Mouth or other Inn. You will find the Preface and dedication and the title Page as I should wish it to stand-for a Romance is a fine thing notwithstanding the circulating Libraries. My respects to Mrs. Hessey and to Percy Street.

Yours very sincerely JOHN KEATS. P. S.-I have been advised to send it to you -you may expect it on Monday-for I sent it by the Postman to Exeter at the same time with this Letter. Adieu!

-

44. TO JAMES RICE

Teignmouth, Tuesday [March 24, 1818]. MY DEAR RICE - Being in the midst of your favourite Devon, I should not, by rights, pen one word but it should contain a vast portion of Wit, Wisdom and learning for I have heard that Milton ere he wrote his answer to Salmasius came into these parts, and for one whole month, rolled himself for three whole hours (per day?), in a certain meadow hard by us where the mark of his nose at equidistances is still shown. The exhibitor of the said meadow further saith, that, after these rollings, not a nettle sprang up in all the seven acres for seven years, and that from the said time, a new sort of plant was made from the whitethorn, of a thornless nature, very much used by the bucks of the present day to rap their boots withal. This account made me very naturally suppose that the nettles and thorns etherealised by the scholar's rotatory motion, and garnered in his head, thence flew after a process of fermentation against the luckless Salmasius and occasioned his well-known and unhappy end. What a happy thing it would be if

we could settle our thoughts and make our minds up on any matter in five minutes, and remain content that is, build a sort of mental cottage of feelings, quiet and pleasant to have a sort of philosophical back-garden, and cheerful holiday-keeping front one-but alas! this never can be: for as the material cottager knows there are such places as France and Italy, and the Andes and burning mountains, so the spiritual Cottager has knowledge of the terra semi-incognita of things unearthly, and cannot for his life keep in the check-rein — or I should stop here quiet and comfortable in my theory of nettles. You will see, however, I am obliged to run wild being attracted by the load-stone concatenation. No sooner had I settled the knotty point of Salmasius, than the Devil put this whim into my head in the likeness of one of Pythagoras's questionings - Did Milton do more good or harm in the world? He wrote, let me inform you (for I have it from a friend, who had it of -,) he wrote Lycidas, Comus, Paradise Lost and other Poems, with much delectable prose He was moreover an active friend to man all his life, and has been since his death. Very good but, my dear Fellow, I must let you know that, as there is ever the same quantity of matter constituting this habitable globe as the ocean notwithstanding the enormous changes and revolutions taking place in some or other of its demesnes - notwithstanding Waterspouts whirlpools and mighty rivers emptying themselves into it still is made up of the same bulk, nor ever varies the number of its atoms - and as a certain bulk of water was instituted at the creation so very likely a certain portion of intellect was spun forth into the thin air, for the brains of man to prey upon it. You will see my drift without any unnecessary parenthesis. That which is contained in the Pacific could not lie in the hollow of

the Caspian that which was in Milton's

head could not find room in Charles the Second's-He like a moon attracted intel

lect to its flow it has not ebbed yet, but has left the shore-pebbles all bare - I mean all Bucks, Authors of Hengist, and Castlereaghs of the present day; who without Milton's gormandising might have been all wise men Now forasmuch as I was very predisposed to a country I had heard you speak so highly of, I took particular notice of everything during my journey, and have bought some folio asses' skins for memorandums. I have seen everything but the wind and that, they say, becomes visible by taking a dose of acorns, or sleeping one night in a hog-trough, with your tail to the Sow-Sow-West. Some of the little Bar-maids look'd at me as if I knew Jem Rice, but when I took (cherry?) Brandy they were quite convinced. One asked whether you preserved (?) a secret she gave you on the nail Another, how many buttons of your coat were buttoned in general. I told her it used to be four But since you had become acquainted with one Martin you had reduced it to three, and had been turning this third one in your mind - and would do so with finger and thumb only you had taken to snuff. I Ihave met with a brace or twain of little Long-heads-not a bit o' the German. All in the neatest little dresses, and avoiding all the puddles, but very fond of peppermint drops, laming ducks and... Well, I can't tell! I hope you are showing poor Reynolds the way to get well. Send me a good account of him, and if I can, I'll send you one of Tom-Oh! for a day and all well!

I went yesterday to Dawlish fair.

Over the Hill and over the Dale,

And over the Bourne to Dawlish, Where ginger-bread wives have a scanty sale, And ginger-bread nuts are smallish, etc. etc.

Tom's remembrances and mine to you all. Your sincere friend

JOHN KEATS.

45. TO JOHN HAMILTON REYNOLDS

[Teignmouth, March 25, 1818.]

MY DEAR REYNOLDS In hopes of cheering you through a Minute or two, I was determined will he nill he to send you some lines, so you will excuse the unconnected subject and careless verse. You know, I am sure, Claude's Enchanted Castle,35 and I wish you may be pleased with my remembrance of it. The Rain is come on again I think with me Devonshire stands a very poor chance. I shall damn it up hill and down dale, if it keep up to the average of six fine days in three weeks. Let me have better news of you.

Tom's remembrances to you. Remember us to all.

Your affectionate friend, JOHN KEATS. [The letter concludes with the lines given on p. 241.]

46. TO BENJAMIN ROBERT HAYDON

Wednesday, [Teignmouth, April 8, 1818]. MY DEAR HAYDON-I am glad you were pleased with my nonsense, and if it so happen that the humour takes me when I have set down to prose to you I will not gainsay it. I should be (God forgive me) ready to swear because I cannot make use of your assistance in going through Devon if I was not in my own Mind determined to visit it thoroughly at some more favourable time of the year. But now Tom (who is getting greatly better) is anxious to be in Town-therefore I put off my threading the County. I purpose within a month to put my knapsack at my back and make a pedestrian tour through the North of England, and part of Scotland - to make a sort of Prologue to the Life I intend to pursue

that is to write, to study and to see all Europe at the lowest expence. I will clamber through the Clouds and exist. I will get such an accumulation of stupendous recollections that as I walk through the suburbs of London I may not see them—I

will stand upon Mount Blanc and remember this coming Summer when I intend to straddle Ben Lomond - with my soul!— galligaskins are out of the Question. I am nearer myself to hear your Christ' is being tinted into immortality. Believe me Haydon your picture is part of myself - I have ever been too sensible of the labyrinthian path to eminence in Art (judging from Poetry) ever to think I understood the emphasis of painting.. The innumerable compositions and decompositions which take place between the intellect and its thousand materials before it arrives at that trembling delicate and snail-horn perception of beauty. I know not your many havens of intenseness -nor ever can know them: but for this I hope not [sic nought ?] you achieve is lost upon me: for when a Schoolboy the abstract Idea I had of an heroic painting I was what I cannot describe. I saw it somewhat sideways, large, prominent, round, and colour'd with magnificence somewhat like the feel I have of Anthony and Cleopatra. Or of Alcibiades leaning on his Crimson Couch in his Galley, his broad shoulders imperceptibly heaving | with the Sea. That passage in Shakspeare is finer than this

'See how the surly Warwick mans the Wall.' I like your consignment of Corneille that's the humour of it- they shall be called your Posthumous Works.86 I don't understand your bit of Italian. I hope she will awake from her dream and flourish fair - my respects to her. The Hedges by this time are beginning to leaf- Cats are becoming more vociferous young Ladies who wear Watches are always looking at them. Women about forty-five think the Season very backward-Ladies' Mares have but half an allowance of food. It rains here again, has been doing so for three days however as I told you I'll take a trial in June, July, or August next year.

I am afraid Wordsworth went rather huffd out of Town-I am sorry for it

he cannot expect his fireside Divan to be infallible — he cannot expect but that every man of worth is as proud as himself. O that he had not fit with a Warrener that is dined at Kingston's. I shall be in town in about a fortnight and then we will have a day or so now and then before I set out on my northern expedition we will have no more abominable Rows-for they leave one in a fearful silence having settled the Methodists let us be rational - not upon compulsion -no- if it will out let it - but I will not play the Bassoon any more deliberately. Remember me to Hazlitt, and Bewick

Your affectionate friend, JOHN KEATS.

47. TO JOHN HAMILTON REYNOLDS

but the eternal Beauty, and the When I am writmere sake of the

Thy. morng., [Teignmouth, April 9, 1818]. MY DEAR REYNOLDS Since you all agree that the thing [the first preface to Endymion] is bad, it must be so-though I am not aware there is anything like Hunt in it (and if there is, it is my natural way, and I have something in common with Hunt). Look it over again, and examine into the motives, the seeds, from which any one sentence sprung- I have not the slightest feel of humility towards the public —or to anything in existence, Being, the Principle of Memory of great Men. ing for myself for the moment's enjoyment, perhaps nature has its course with me - but a Preface is written to the Public; a thing I cannot help looking upon as an Enemy, and which I cannot address without feelings of Hostility. If I write a Preface in a supple or subdued style, it will not be in character with me as a public speaker I would be subdued before my friends, and thank them for subduing me - but among Multitudes of Men -I have no feel of stooping, I hate the idea of humility to them.

I never wrote one single Line of Poetry with the least Shadow of public thought.

Forgive me for vexing you and making a Trojan horse of such a Trifle, both with respect to the matter in Question, and myself- but it eases me to tell you I could not live without the love of my friends - I would jump down Etna for any great Public good

but I hate a Mawkish Popularity. I cannot be subdued before them - My glory would be to daunt and dazzle the thousand jabberers about Pictures and Books-I see swarms of Porcupines with their Quills erect 'like lime-twigs set to catch my Wingèd Book,' and I would fright them away with a torch. You will say my

Preface is not much of a Torch. It would have been too insulting 'to begin from Jove,' and I could not set a golden head upon a thing of clay. If there is any fault in the Preface it is not affectation, but an undersong of disrespect to the Public — if I write another Preface it must be done without a thought of those people - I will think about it. If it should not reach you in four or five days, tell Taylor to publish it without a Preface, and let the Dedication simply stand - 'inscribed to the Memory of Thomas Chatterton.'

I had resolved last night to write to you this morning I wish it had been about something else something to greet you towards the close of your long illness. I have had one or two intimations of your going to Hampstead for a space; and I regret to see your confounded Rheumatism keeps you in Little Britain where I am sure the air is too confined. Devonshire continues rainy. As the drops beat against the window, they give me the same sensation as a quart of cold water offered to revive a half-drowned devil-no feel of the clouds dropping fatness; but as if the roots of the earth were rotten, cold, and drenched. I have not been able to go to Kent's cave at Babbicombe however on one very beautiful day I had a fine Clamber over the rocks all along as far as that place. I shall be in Town in about Ten days. We go by way of Bath on purpose to call

I have many reasons for going wonderways: to make my winter chair free from spleen to enlarge my vision — to escape disquisitions on Poetry and Kingston Criticism; to promote digestion and economise shoe-leather. I'll have leather buttons and belt; and, if Brown holds his mind, over the Hills we go. If my Books will help me to it, then will I take all Europe in turn, and see the Kingdoms of the Earth and the glory of them. Tom is getting better, he hopes you may meet him at the top o' the hill. My Love to your nurses. I

[Teignmouth,] Friday [April 10, 1818). MY DEAR REYNOLDS -I am anxious you should find this Preface tolerable. If there is an affectation in it 't is natural to me. Do let the Printer's Devil cook it, and let me be as ‘the casing air.’

You are too good in this Matter — were I in your state, I am certain I should have no thought but of discontent and illness I might though be taught patience: I had an idea of giving no Preface; however, don't you think this had better go? O, let it -one should not be too timid - of committing faults.

The climate here weighs us down completely; Tom is quite low-spirited. It is impossible to live in a country which is continually under hatches. Who would live in a region of Mists, Game Laws, indemnity Bills, etc., when there is such a place as Italy? It is said this England from its Clime produces a Spleen, able to engender the finest Sentiments, and cover the whole