ON SITTING DOWN TO KING LEAR ONCE AGAIN.O golden-tongued Romance with serene Lute!Fair-plumed Syren, Queen of far-away!Leave melodising on this wintry day,Shut up thine olden volume and be mute.Adieu! for once again the fierce disputeBetwixt Hell torment and impassion’d ClayMust I burn through; once more assayThe bitter sweet of this Shakspearian fruit.Chief Poet! and ye clouds of Albion,Begetters of our deep eternal theme,When I am through the old oak forest goneLet me not wander in a barren dream,But, when I am consumed with the Fire,Give me new Phœnix-wings to fly at my desire.
ON SITTING DOWN TO KING LEAR ONCE AGAIN.
O golden-tongued Romance with serene Lute!Fair-plumed Syren, Queen of far-away!Leave melodising on this wintry day,Shut up thine olden volume and be mute.Adieu! for once again the fierce disputeBetwixt Hell torment and impassion’d ClayMust I burn through; once more assayThe bitter sweet of this Shakspearian fruit.Chief Poet! and ye clouds of Albion,Begetters of our deep eternal theme,When I am through the old oak forest goneLet me not wander in a barren dream,But, when I am consumed with the Fire,Give me new Phœnix-wings to fly at my desire.
So you see I am getting at it, with a sort of determination and strength, though verily I do not feel it at this moment—this is my fourth letter this morning, and I feel rather tired, and my head rather swimming—so I will leave it open till to-morrow’s post.—
I am in the habit of taking my papers to Dilke’s and copying there; so I chat and proceed at the same time. I have been there at my work this evening, and the walk over the Heath takes off all sleep, so I will even proceed with you. I left off short in my last just as I began an account of a private theatrical—Well it was of the lowest order, all greasy and oily, insomuch that if they had lived in olden times, when signs were hung over the doors, the only appropriate one for that oily place would have been—a guttered Candle. They played John Bull, The Review, and it was to conclude with Bombastes Furioso—I saw from a Box the first Act of John Bull, then went to Drury and did not return till it was over—when by Wells’s interest we got behind the scenes—there was not a yard wide all the way round for actors, scene-shifters, and interlopers to move in—for ‘Nota Bene’ the Green Room was under the stage, and there was I threatened over and over again to be turned out by the oily scene-shifters, there did I hear a little paintedTrollop own, very candidly, that she had failed in Mary, with a “damn’d if she’d play a serious part again, as long as she lived,” and at the same time she was habited as the Quaker in the Review.—There was a quarrel, and a fat good-natured looking girl in soldiers’ clothes wished she had only been a man for Tom’s sake. One fellow began a song, but an unlucky finger-point from the Gallery sent him off like a shot. One chap was dressed to kill for the King in Bombastes, and he stood at the edge of the scene in the very sweat of anxiety to show himself, but Alas the thing was not played. The sweetest morsel of the night moreover was, that the musicians began pegging and fagging away—at an overture—never did you see faces more in earnest, three times did they play it over, dropping all kinds of corrections and still did not the curtain go up. Well then they went into a country dance, then into a region they well knew, into the old boonsome Pothouse, and then to see how pompous o’ the sudden they turned; how they looked about and chatted; how they did not care a damn; was a great treat——
I hope I have not tired you by this filling up of the dash in my last. Constable the bookseller has offered Reynolds ten guineas a sheet to write for his Magazine—it is an Edinburgh one, which Blackwood’s started up in opposition to. Hunt said he was nearly sure that the ‘Cockney School’ was written by Scott[44]so you are right Tom!—There are no more little bits of news I can remember at present.
I remain, My dear Brothers, Your very affectionate BrotherJohn.
[Hampstead,] Friday Jany.23 [1818].
My dear Bailey—Twelve days have pass’d since your last reached me.—What has gone through the myriads of human minds since the 12th? We talk of the immense Number of Books, the Volumes ranged thousands by thousands—but perhaps more goes through the human intelligence in Twelve days than ever was written.—How has that unfortunate family lived through the twelve?One saying of yours I shall never forget—you may not recollect it—it being perhaps said when you were looking on the Surface and seeming of Humanity alone, without a thought of the past or the future—or the deeps of good and evil—you were at that moment estranged from speculation, and I think you have arguments ready for the Man who would utter it to you—this is a formidable preface for a simple thing—merely you said, “Why should woman suffer?” Aye, why should she? “By heavens I’d coin my very Soul, and drop my Blood for Drachmas!” These things are, and he, who feels how incompetent the most skyey Knight-errantry is to heal this bruised fairness, is like a sensitive leaf on the hot hand of thought.—Your tearing, my dear friend, a spiritless and gloomy letter up, to re-write to me, is what I shall never forget—it was to me a real thing—Things have happened lately of great perplexity—you must have heard of them—Reynolds and Haydon retorting and recriminating—and parting for ever—the same thing has happened between Haydon and Hunt. It is unfortunate—Men should bear with each other: there lives not the Man who may not be cut up, aye Lashed to pieces on his weakest side. The best of Men have but a portion of good in them—a kind of spiritual yeast in their frames, which creates the ferment of existence—by which a Man is propelled to act, and strive, and buffet with Circumstance. The sure way, Bailey, is first toknow a Man’s faults, and then be passive—if after that he insensibly draws you towards him then you have no power to break the link. Before I felt interested in either Reynolds or Haydon, I was well read in their faults; yet, knowing them, I have been cementing gradually with both. I have an affection for them both, for reasons almost opposite—and to both must I of necessity cling, supported always by the hope that, when a little time, a few years, shall have tried me more fully in their esteem, I may be able to bring them together. The time must come, because they have both hearts: and they will recollect the best parts of each other, when this gust is overblown.—I had a message from you through a letter to Jane—I think, about Cripps—there can be no idea of binding until a sufficient sum is sure for him—and even then the thing should be maturely considered by all his helpers—I shall try my luck upon as many fat purses as I can meet with.—Cripps is improving very fast: I have the greater hopes of him because he is so slow in development. A Man of great executing powers at 20, with a look and a speech almost stupid, is sure to do something.
I have just looked through the Second Side of your Letter—I feel a great content at it.—I was at Hunt’s the other day, and he surprised me with a real authenticated lock ofMilton’s Hair. I know you would like what I wrote thereon, so here it is—as they say of a Sheep in a Nursery Book:—
ON SEEING A LOCK OF MILTON’S HAIR.Chief of Organic Numbers!Old Scholar of the Spheres!Thy spirit never slumbers,But rolls about our earsFor ever, and for ever!O what a mad endeavourWorketh he,Who to thy sacred and ennobled hearseWould offer a burnt sacrifice of verseAnd melody.How heavenward thou soundest,Live Temple of sweet noise,And Discord unconfoundest,Giving Delight new joys,And Pleasure nobler pinions!O, where are thy dominions?Lend thine earTo a young Delian oath,—aye, by thy soul,By all that from thy mortal lips did roll,And by the kernel of thine earthly love,Beauty, in things on earth, and things above,I swear!When every childish fashionHas vanish’d from my rhyme,Will I, gray-gone in passion,Leave to an after-time,Hymning and harmonyOf thee, and of thy works, and of thy life;But vain is now the burning and the strife,Pangs are in vain, until I grow high-rifeWith old Philosophy,And mad with glimpses of futurity!For many years my offering must be hush’d;When I do speak, I’ll think upon this hour,Because I feel my forehead hot and flush’d,Even at the simplest vassal of thy power,—A lock of thy bright hair,—Sudden it came,And I was startled, when I caught thy nameCoupled so unaware;Yet, at the moment, temperate was my blood.I thought I had beheld it from the flood.
ON SEEING A LOCK OF MILTON’S HAIR.
Chief of Organic Numbers!Old Scholar of the Spheres!Thy spirit never slumbers,But rolls about our earsFor ever, and for ever!O what a mad endeavourWorketh he,Who to thy sacred and ennobled hearseWould offer a burnt sacrifice of verseAnd melody.How heavenward thou soundest,Live Temple of sweet noise,And Discord unconfoundest,Giving Delight new joys,And Pleasure nobler pinions!O, where are thy dominions?Lend thine earTo a young Delian oath,—aye, by thy soul,By all that from thy mortal lips did roll,And by the kernel of thine earthly love,Beauty, in things on earth, and things above,I swear!When every childish fashionHas vanish’d from my rhyme,Will I, gray-gone in passion,Leave to an after-time,Hymning and harmonyOf thee, and of thy works, and of thy life;But vain is now the burning and the strife,Pangs are in vain, until I grow high-rifeWith old Philosophy,And mad with glimpses of futurity!For many years my offering must be hush’d;When I do speak, I’ll think upon this hour,Because I feel my forehead hot and flush’d,Even at the simplest vassal of thy power,—A lock of thy bright hair,—Sudden it came,And I was startled, when I caught thy nameCoupled so unaware;Yet, at the moment, temperate was my blood.I thought I had beheld it from the flood.
This I did at Hunt’s at his request—perhaps I should have done something better alone and at home.—I have sent my first Book to the press, and this afternoon shall begin preparing the Second—my visit to you will be a great spur to quicken the proceeding.—I have not had your Sermon returned—I long to make it the Subject of a Letter to you—What do they say at Oxford?
I trust you and Gleig pass much fine time together. Remember me to him and Whitehead. My Brother Tom is getting stronger, but his spitting of Blood continues. I sat down to read King Lear yesterday, and felt thegreatness of the thing up to the Writing of a Sonnet preparatory thereto—in my next you shall have it.—There were some miserable reports of Rice’s health—I went, and lo! Master Jemmy had been to the play the night before, and was out at the time—he always comes on his legs like a Cat. I have seen a good deal of Wordsworth. Hazlitt is lecturing on Poetry at the Surrey Institution—I shall be there next Tuesday.
Your most affectionate friendJohn Keats.
[Hampstead, January 30, 1818.]
My dear Taylor—These lines as they now stand about “happiness,” have rung in my ears like “a chime a mending”—See here,
“BeholdWherein lies happiness, Peona? fold, etc.”
It appears to me the very contrary of blessed. I hope this will appear to you more eligible.
“Wherein lies Happiness? In that which becksOur ready minds to fellowship divine,A fellowship with Essence till we shineFull alchemised, and free of space—BeholdThe clear religion of Heaven—fold, etc.”
You must indulge me by putting this in, for setting aside the badness of the other, such a preface is necessary to the subject. The whole thing must, I think, have appeared to you, who are a consecutive man, as a thing almost of mere words, but I assure you that, when I wrote it, it was a regular stepping of the Imagination towards a truth. My having written that argument will perhaps be of the greatest service to me of anything I ever did. It set before me the gradations of happiness, even like a kind of pleasure thermometer, and is my first step towards the chief attempt in the drama. The playing of different natures with joy andSorrow—Do me this favour, and believe me
Your sincere friendJ. Keats.
I hope your next work will be of a more general Interest. I suppose you cogitate a little about it, now and then.
Hampstead, Saturday [January 31, 1818].
My dear Reynolds—I have parcelled out this day for Letter Writing—more resolved thereon because your Letter will come as a refreshment and will have (sic parvis etc.) the same effect as a Kiss in certain situations where people become over-generous. I have read this first sentence over, and think it savours rather; however an inward innocence is like a nested dove, as the old song says....
Now I purposed to write to you a serious poetical letter, but I find that a maxim I met with the other day is a just one: “On cause míeux quand on ne dit pascausons.” I was hindered, however, from my first intention by a mere muslin Handkerchief very neatly pinned—but “Hence, vain deluding,” etc. Yet I cannot write in prose; it is a sunshiny day and I cannot, so here goes,—
Hence Burgundy, Claret, and Port,Away with old Hock and Madeira,Too earthly ye are for my sport;There’s a beverage brighter and clearer.Instead of a pitiful rummer,My wine overbrims a whole summer;My bowl is the sky,And I drink at my eye,Till I feel in the brainA Delphian pain—Then follow, my Caius! then follow:On the green of the hillWe will drink our fillOf golden sunshine,Till our brains intertwineWith the glory and grace of Apollo!God of the Meridian,And of the East and West,To thee my soul is flown,And my body is earthward press’d.—It is an awful mission,A terrible division;And leaves a gulph austereTo be fill’d with worldly fear.Aye, when the soul is fledToo high above our head,Affrighted do we gazeAfter its airy maze,As doth a mother wild,When her young infant childIs in an eagle’s claws—And is not this the causeOf madness?—God of Song,Thou bearest me alongThrough sights I scarce can bear:O let me, let me shareWith the hot lyre and thee,The staid Philosophy.Temper my lonely hours,And let me see thy bowersMore unalarm’d!
My dear Reynolds, you must forgive all this ranting—but the fact is, I cannot write sense this Morning—however you shall have some—I will copy out my last Sonnet.
When I have fears that I may cease to beBefore my pen has glean’d my teeming brain,Before high piled Books in charactery,Hold like rich garners the full ripen’d grain—When I behold, upon the night’s starr’d face,Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,And think that I may never live to traceTheir shadows, with the magic hand of chance;And when I feel, fair creature of an hour,That I shall never look upon thee more,Never have relish in the faery powerOf unreflecting Love;—then on the shoreOf the wide world I stand alone, and thinkTill Love and Fame to nothingness do sink.
I must take a turn, and then write to Teignmouth. Remember me to all, not excepting yourself.
Your sincere friendJohn Keats.
Hampstead, Tuesday [February 3, 1818].
My dear Reynolds—I thank you for your dish of Filberts—would I could get a basket of them by way of dessert every day for the sum of twopence.[45]Would we were a sort of ethereal Pigs, and turned loose to feed upon spiritual Mast and Acorns—which would be merely being a squirrel and feeding upon filberts, for what is a squirrel but an airy pig, or a filbert but a sort of archangelical acorn? About the nuts being worth cracking, all I can say is, that where there are a throng of delightful Images ready drawn, simplicity is the only thing. The first is the best on account of the first line, and the “arrow, foil’d of its antler’d food,” and moreover (and this is the only word or two I find fault with, the more because I have had so much reason to shun it as a quicksand) the last has “tender and true.” We must cut this, and not be rattlesnaked into any more of the like. It may be said that we ought to read our contemporaries, that Wordsworth, etc., should have their due from us. But, for the sake of a few fine imaginative or domestic passages, are we to be bullied into a certain Philosophy engendered in the whims of an Egotist? Every man has his speculations, but every man does not brood and peacock over them till he makes a false coinage and deceives himself. Many a man can travel to the very bourne of Heaven, and yet want confidence to put down his half-seeing. Sancho will invent a Journey heavenwardas well as anybody. We hate poetry that has a palpable design upon us, and, if we do not agree, seems to put its hand into its breeches pocket. Poetry should be great and unobtrusive, a thing which enters into one’s soul, and does not startle it or amaze it with itself—but with its subject. How beautiful are the retired flowers!—how would they lose their beauty were they to throng into the highway, crying out, “Admire me, I am a violet! Dote upon me, I am a primrose!” Modern poets differ from the Elizabethans in this: each of the moderns like an Elector of Hanover governs his petty state and knows how many straws are swept daily from the Causeways in all his dominions, and has a continual itching that all the Housewives should have their coppers well scoured: The ancients were Emperors of vast Provinces, they had only heard of the remote ones and scarcely cared to visit them. I will cut all this—I will have no more of Wordsworth or Hunt in particular—Why should we be of the tribe of Manasseh, when we can wander with Esau? Why should we kick against the Pricks, when we can walk on Roses? Why should we be owls, when we can be eagles? Why be teased with “nice-eyed wagtails,” when we have in sight “the Cherub Contemplation”? Why with Wordsworth’s “Matthew with a bough of wilding in his hand,” when we can have Jacques “under an oak,” etc.? The secret of the Bough of Wilding will run through your head faster than I can write it. Old Matthew spoke to him some years ago on some nothing, and because he happens in an Evening Walk to imagine the figure of the old Man, he must stamp it down in black and white, and it is henceforth sacred. I don’t mean to deny Wordsworth’s grandeur and Hunt’s merit, but I mean to say we need not be teased with grandeur and merit when we can have them uncontaminated and unobtrusive. Let us have the old Poets and Robin Hood. Your letter and its sonnets gave me more pleasure than will the Fourth Book of Childe Harold and the whole of anybody’s life and opinions.In return for your Dish of Filberts, I have gathered a few Catkins, I hope they’ll look pretty.
TO J. H. R. IN ANSWER TO HIS ROBIN HOOD SONNETS.No! those days are gone away,And their hours are old and gray,And their minutes buried allUnder the down-trodden pallOf the leaves of many years.Many times have Winter’s shears,Frozen North and chilling East,Sounded tempests to the feastOf the forest’s whispering fleeces,Since men paid no rent on Leases.No! the Bugle sounds no more,And the twanging bow no more;Silent is the ivory shrillPast the heath and up the Hill;There is no mid-forest laugh,Where lone Echo gives the halfTo some wight amaz’d to hearJesting, deep in forest drear.On the fairest time of JuneYou may go with Sun or Moon,Or the seven stars to light you,Or the polar ray to right you;But you never may beholdLittle John or Robin bold;Never any of all the clan,Thrumming on an empty canSome old hunting ditty, whileHe doth his green way beguileTo fair Hostess MerrimentDown beside the pasture Trent,For he left the merry tale,Messenger for spicy ale.Gone the merry morris din,Gone the song of Gamelyn,Gone the tough-belted outlawIdling in the “grenè shawe”:All are gone away and past!And if Robinshouldbe castSudden from his turfed grave,And if MarianshouldhaveOnce again her forest days,She would weep, and he would craze:He would swear, for all his oaks,Fall’n beneath the Dock-yard strokes,Have rotted on the briny seas;She would weep that her wild beesSang not to her—“strange that honeyCan’t be got without hard money!”So it is! yet let us sing,Honour to the old bow-string,Honour to the bugle-horn,Honour to the woods unshorn,Honour to the Lincoln green,Honour to the archer keen,Honour to tight little John,And the horse he rode upon:Honour to bold Robin Hood,Sleeping in the underwood!Honour to maid Marian,And to all the Sherwood clan—Though their days have hurried byLet us two a burden try.
TO J. H. R. IN ANSWER TO HIS ROBIN HOOD SONNETS.
No! those days are gone away,And their hours are old and gray,And their minutes buried allUnder the down-trodden pallOf the leaves of many years.Many times have Winter’s shears,Frozen North and chilling East,Sounded tempests to the feastOf the forest’s whispering fleeces,Since men paid no rent on Leases.No! the Bugle sounds no more,And the twanging bow no more;Silent is the ivory shrillPast the heath and up the Hill;There is no mid-forest laugh,Where lone Echo gives the halfTo some wight amaz’d to hearJesting, deep in forest drear.On the fairest time of JuneYou may go with Sun or Moon,Or the seven stars to light you,Or the polar ray to right you;But you never may beholdLittle John or Robin bold;Never any of all the clan,Thrumming on an empty canSome old hunting ditty, whileHe doth his green way beguileTo fair Hostess MerrimentDown beside the pasture Trent,For he left the merry tale,Messenger for spicy ale.Gone the merry morris din,Gone the song of Gamelyn,Gone the tough-belted outlawIdling in the “grenè shawe”:All are gone away and past!And if Robinshouldbe castSudden from his turfed grave,And if MarianshouldhaveOnce again her forest days,She would weep, and he would craze:He would swear, for all his oaks,Fall’n beneath the Dock-yard strokes,Have rotted on the briny seas;She would weep that her wild beesSang not to her—“strange that honeyCan’t be got without hard money!”So it is! yet let us sing,Honour to the old bow-string,Honour to the bugle-horn,Honour to the woods unshorn,Honour to the Lincoln green,Honour to the archer keen,Honour to tight little John,And the horse he rode upon:Honour to bold Robin Hood,Sleeping in the underwood!Honour to maid Marian,And to all the Sherwood clan—Though their days have hurried byLet us two a burden try.
I hope you will like them—they are at least written in the Spirit of Outlawry. Here are the Mermaid lines,
Souls of Poets dead and gone,What Elysium have ye known,Happy field, or mossy cavern,Fairer than the Mermaid Tavern?Have ye tippled drink more fineThan mine Host’s Canary wine?Or are fruits of paradiseSweeter than those dainty piesOf Venison? O generous foodDrest as though bold Robin HoodWould with his Maid Marian,Sup and bowse from horn and can.I have heard that, on a day,Mine host’s sign-board flew away,No body knew whither, tillAn astrologer’s old QuillTo a sheepskin gave the story,Said he saw you in your glory,Underneath a new old-signSipping beverage divine,And pledging with contented smack,The Mermaid in the Zodiac.Souls of Poets dead and gone,Are the winds a sweeter home?Richer is uncellar’d cavern,Than the merry mermaid Tavern?[46]
I will call on you at 4 to-morrow, and we will trudge together, for it is not the thing to be a stranger in the Land of Harpsicols. I hope also to bring you my 2nd Book. In the hope that these Scribblings will be some amusement for you this Evening, I remain, copying on the Hill,
Your sincere friend and Co-scribblerJohn Keats.
Fleet Street, Thursday Morn [February 5, 1818].
My dear Taylor—I have finished copying my Second Book—but I want it for one day to overlook it. And moreover this day I have very particular employ in the affair of Cripps—so I trespass on your indulgence, and take advantage of your good nature. You shall hear from me or see me soon. I will tell Reynolds of your engagement to-morrow.
Yours unfeignedlyJohn Keats.
Hampstead, Saturday Night [February 14, 1818].
My dear Brothers—When once a man delays a letter beyond the proper time, he delays it longer, for one or two reasons—first, because he must begin in a very common-place style, that is to say, with an excuse; and secondly things and circumstances become so jumbled in his mind, that he knows not what, or what not, he has said in his last—I shall visit you as soon as I have copied my poem all out, I am now much beforehand with the printer, they have done none yet, and I amhalf afraid they will let half the season by before the printing. I am determined they shall not trouble me when I have copied it all.—Horace Smith has lent me his manuscript called “Nehemiah Muggs, an exposure of the Methodists”—perhaps I may send you a few extracts—Hazlitt’s last Lecture was on Thomson, Cowper, and Crabbe, he praised Thomson and Cowper but he gave Crabbe an unmerciful licking—I think Hunt’s article of Fazio—no it was not, but I saw Fazio the first night, it hung rather heavily on me—I am in the high way of being introduced to a squad of people, Peter Pindar, Mrs. Opie, Mrs. Scott—Mr. Robinson a great friend of Coleridge’s called on me.[47]Richards tells me that my poems are known in the west country, and that he saw a very clever copy of verses, headed with a Motto from my Sonnet to George—Honours rush so thickly upon me that I shall not be able to bear up against them. What think you—am I to be crowned in the Capitol, am I to be made a Mandarin—No! I am to be invited, Mrs. Hunt tells me, to a party at Ollier’s, to keep Shakspeare’s birthday—Shakspeare would stare to see me there.[48]The Wednesday before last Shelley, Hunt and I wrote each a Sonnet on the River Nile, some day you shall read them all. I saw a sheet of Endymion, and have all reason to suppose they will soon get it done, there shall be nothing wanting on my part. I have been writing at intervals many songs and Sonnets, and I long to be at Teignmouth, to read them over to you: however I think I had better wait till this Book is off my mind; it will not be long first.
Reynolds has been writing two very capital articles, in the Yellow Dwarf, on popular Preachers—All the talk here is about Dr. Croft the Duke of Devon etc.
Your most affectionate BrotherJohn.
[Hampstead, February 19, 1818.]
My dear Reynolds—I had an idea that a Man might pass a very pleasant life in this manner—Let him on a certain day read a certain page of full Poesy or distilled Prose, and let him wander with it, and muse upon it, and reflect from it, and bring home to it, and prophesy upon it, and dream upon it: until it becomes stale—But when will it do so? Never—When Man has arrived at a certain ripeness in intellect any one grand and spiritual passage serves him as a starting-post towards all “the two-and-thirty Palaces.” How happy is such a voyage of conception, what delicious diligent indolence! A doze upon a sofa does not hinder it, and a nap upon Clover engenders ethereal finger-pointings—the prattle of a child gives it wings, and the converse of middle-age a strength to beat them—a strain of music conducts to “an odd angle of the Isle,” and when the leaves whisper it puts a girdle round the earth.—Nor will this sparing touch of noble Books be any irreverence to their Writers—for perhaps the honors paid by Man to Man are trifles in comparison to the benefit done by great works to the “spirit and pulse of good” by their mere passive existence. Memory should not be called Knowledge—Many have original minds who do not think it—they are led away by Custom. Now it appears to me that almost any Man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own airy Citadel—the points of leaves and twigs on which the spider begins her work are few, and she fills the air with a beautiful circuiting. Man should be content with as few points to tip with the fine Web of his Soul, and weave a tapestry empyrean—full of symbols for his spiritual eye, of softness for his spiritual touch, of space for his wandering, of distinctness for his luxury. But the minds of mortals are so different and bent on such diverse journeys that it may at first appear impossible for anycommon taste and fellowship to exist between two or three under these suppositions. It is however quite the contrary. Minds would leave each other in contrary directions, traverse each other in numberless points, and at last greet each other at the journey’s end. An old man and a child would talk together and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinking. Man should not dispute or assert, but whisper results to his Neighbour, and thus by every germ of spirit sucking the sap from mould ethereal every human might become great, and humanity instead of being a wide heath of furze and briars, with here and there a remote Oak or Pine, would become a grand democracy of forest trees. It has been an old comparison for our urging on—the beehive—however it seems to me that we should rather be the flower than the Bee—for it is a false notion that more is gained by receiving than giving—no, the receiver and the giver are equal in their benefits. The flower, I doubt not, receives a fair guerdon from the Bee—its leaves blush deeper in the next spring—and who shall say between Man and Woman which is the most delighted? Now it is more noble to sit like Jove than to fly like Mercury:—let us not therefore go hurrying about and collecting honey, bee-like, buzzing here and there impatiently from a knowledge of what is to be arrived at. But let us open our leaves like a flower, and be passive and receptive; budding patiently under the eye of Apollo and taking hints from every noble insect that favours us with a visit—Sap will be given us for meat, and dew for drink. I was led into these thoughts, my dear Reynolds, by the beauty of the morning operating on a sense of Idleness. I have not read any Books—the Morning said I was right—I had no idea but of the Morning, and the Thrush said I was right—seeming to say,
“O thou whose face hath felt the Winter’s wind,Whose eye has seen the snow-clouds hung in Mist,And the black Elmtops ’mong the freezing stars:To thee the Spring will be a harvest-time—O thou, whose only book has been the lightOf supreme darkness which thou feddest onNight after night, when Phœbus was away,To thee the Spring shall be a triple morn—O fret not after knowledge—I have none,And yet my song comes native with the warmth.O fret not after knowledge—I have none,And yet the Evening listens. He who saddensAt thought of idleness cannot be idle,And he’s awake who thinks himself asleep.”
Now I am sensible all this is a mere sophistication (however it may neighbour to any truths), to excuse my own indolence—So I will not deceive myself that Man should be equal with Jove—but think himself very well off as a sort of scullion-Mercury or even a humble-bee. It is no matter whether I am right or wrong either one way or another, if there is sufficient to lift a little time from your shoulders—
Your affectionate friendJohn Keats.
Hampstead, Saturday [February 21, 1818].
My dear Brothers—I am extremely sorry to have given you so much uneasiness by not writing; however, you know good news is no news or vice versâ. I do not like to write a short letter to you, or you would have had one long before. The weather although boisterous to-day has been very much milder; and I think Devonshire is not the last place to receive a temperate Change. I have been abominably idle since you left, but have just turned over a new leaf, and used as a marker a letter of excuse to an invitation from Horace Smith. The occasion of my writing to-day is the enclosed letter—by Postmark from Miss W——[49]Does she expect you in town George? I received a letter the other day from Haydon, in which he says, his Essays on the Elgin Marbles are being translated into Italian, the which he superintends. I did notmention that I had seen the British Gallery, there are some nice things by Stark, and Bathsheba by Wilkie, which is condemned. I could not bear Alston’s Uriel.
Reynolds has been very ill for some time, confined to the house, and had leeches applied to his chest; when I saw him on Wednesday he was much the same, and he is in the worst place for amendment, among the strife of women’s tongues, in a hot and parch’d room: I wish he would move to Butler’s for a short time. The Thrushes and Blackbirds have been singing me into an idea that it was Spring, and almost that leaves were on the trees. So that black clouds and boisterous winds seem to have mustered and collected in full Divan, for the purpose of convincing me to the contrary. Taylor says my poem shall be out in a month, I think he will be out before it....
The thrushes are singing now as if they would speak to the winds, because their big brother Jack, the Spring, was not far off. I am reading Voltaire and Gibbon, although I wrote to Reynolds the other day to prove reading of no use; I have not seen Hunt since, I am a good deal with Dilke and Brown, we are very thick; they are very kind to me, they are well. I don’t think I could stop in Hampstead but for their neighbourhood. I hear Hazlitt’s lectures regularly, his last was on Gray, Collins, Young, etc., and he gave a very fine piece of discriminating Criticism on Swift, Voltaire, and Rabelais. I was very disappointed at his treatment of Chatterton. I generally meet with many I know there. Lord Byron’s 4th Canto is expected out, and I heard somewhere, that Walter Scott has a new Poem in readiness. I am sorry that Wordsworth has left a bad impression wherever he visited in town by his egotism, Vanity, and bigotry. Yet he is a great poet if not a philosopher. I have not yet read Shelley’s Poem, I do not suppose you have it yet, at the Teignmouth libraries. These double letters must come rather heavy, I hope you have a moderate portion of cash, but don’t fret at all, if you have not—Lord! I intend to play atcut and run as well as Falstaff, that is to say, before he got so lusty.
I remain praying for your health my dear Brothers
Your affectionate BrotherJohn.
Hampstead, February 27 [1818].
My dear Taylor—Your alteration strikes me as being a great Improvement—And now I will attend to the punctuations you speak of—The comma should be atsoberly, and in the other passage, the Comma should followquiet. I am extremely indebted to you for this alteration, and also for your after admonitions. It is a sorry thing for me that any one should have to overcome prejudices in reading my verses—that affects me more than any hypercriticism on any particular passage—In Endymion, I have most likely but moved into the go-cart from the leading-strings—In poetry I have a few axioms, and you will see how far I am from their centre.
1st. I think poetry should surprise by a fine excess, and not by singularity; It should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance.
2d. Its touches of beauty should never be half-way, thereby making the reader breathless, instead of content. The rise, the progress, the setting of Imagery should, like the sun, come natural to him, shine over him, and set soberly, although in magnificence, leaving him in the luxury of twilight. But it is easier to think what poetry should be, than to write it—And this leads me to
Another axiom—That if poetry comes not as naturally as the leaves to a tree, it had better not come at all.—However it may be with me, I cannot help looking into new countries with “O for a Muse of Fire to ascend!” If Endymion serves me as a pioneer, perhaps I ought to be content—I have great reason to be content, for thank God I can read, and perhaps understandShakspeare to his depths; and I have I am sure many friends, who, if I fail, will attribute any change in my life and temper to humbleness rather than pride—to a cowering under the wings of great poets, rather than to a bitterness that I am not appreciated. I am anxious to get Endymion printed that I may forget it and proceed. I have copied the 3rd Book and begun the 4th. On running my eye over the proofs, I saw one mistake—I will notice it presently, and also any others, if there be any. There should be no comma in “the raft branch down sweeping from a tall ash-top.” I have besides made one or two alterations, and also altered the thirteenth line p. 32 to make sense of it, as you will see. I will take care the printer shall not trip up my heels. There should be no dash after Dryope, in the line “Dryope’s lone lulling of her child.”
Remember me to Percy Street.
Your sincere and obliged friendJohn Keats.
P.S.—You shall have a short preface in good time.
[Hampstead, March 1818?]
My dear Sirs—I am this morning making a general clearance of all lent Books—all—I am afraid I do not return all—I must fog your memories about them—however with many thanks here are the remainder—which I am afraid are not worth so much now as they were six months ago—I mean the fashions may have changed—
Yours trulyJohn Keats.
Teignmouth, Friday [March 13, 1818].[50]
My dear Bailey—When a poor devil is drowning, it is said he comes thrice to the surface ere he makes hisfinal sink—if however even at the third rise he can manage to catch hold of a piece of weed or rock he stands a fair chance, as I hope I do now, of being saved. I have sunk twice in our correspondence, have risen twice, and have been too idle, or something worse, to extricate myself. I have sunk the third time, and just now risen again at this two of the ClockP.M., and saved myself from utter perdition by beginning this, all drenched as I am, and fresh from the water. And I would rather endure the present inconvenience of a wet jacket than you should keep a laced one in store for me. Why did I not stop at Oxford in my way? How can you ask such a Question? Why, did I not promise to do so? Did I not in a letter to you make a promise to do so? Then how can you be so unreasonable as to ask me why I did not? This is the thing—(for I have been rubbing up my Invention—trying several sleights—I first polished a cold, felt it in my fingers, tried it on the table, but could not pocket it:—I tried Chillblains, Rheumatism, Gout, tight boots,—nothing of that sort would do,—so this is, as I was going to say, the thing)—I had a letter from Tom, saying how much better he had got, and thinking he had better stop—I went down to prevent his coming up. Will not this do? turn it which way you like—it is selvaged all round. I have used it, these three last days, to keep out the abominable Devonshire weather—by the by, you may say what you will of Devonshire: the truth is, it is a splashy, rainy, misty, snowy, foggy, haily, floody, muddy, slipshod county. The hills are very beautiful, when you get a sight of ’em—the primroses are out, but then you are in—the Cliffs are of a fine deep colour, but then the Clouds are continually vieing with them—the Women like your London people in a sort of negative way—because the native men are the poorest creatures in England—because Government never have thought it worth while to send a recruiting party among them. When I think of Wordsworth’s sonnet “Vanguard of Liberty! ye men of Kent!”the degenerated race about me are Pulvis ipecac. simplex—a strong dose. Were I a corsair, I’d make a descent on the south coast of Devon; if I did not run the chance of having Cowardice imputed to me. As for the men, they’d run away into the Methodist meeting-houses, and the women would be glad of it. Had England been a large Devonshire, we should not have won the Battle of Waterloo. There are knotted oaks—there are lusty rivulets? there are meadows such as are not—there are valleys of feminine[51]climate—but there are no thews and sinews—Moore’s Almanack is here a Curiosity—Arms, neck, and shoulders may at least be seen there, and the ladies read it as some out-of-the-way Romance. Such a quelling Power have these thoughts over me that I fancy the very air of a deteriorating quality. I fancy the flowers, all precocious, have an Acrasian spell about them—I feel able to beat off the Devonshire waves like soapfroth. I think it well for the honour of Britain that Julius Cæsar did not first land in this County. A Devonshirer standing on his native hills is not a distinct object—he does not show against the light—a wolf or two would dispossess him. I like, I love England. I like its living men—give me a long brown plain “for my morning,”[51]so I may meet with some of Edmund Ironside’s descendants. Give me a barren mould, so I may meet with some shadowing of Alfred in the shape of a Gipsy, a huntsman or a shepherd. Scenery is fine—but human nature is finer—the sward is richer for the tread of a real nervous English foot—the Eagle’s nest is finer, for the Mountaineer has looked into it. Are these facts or prejudices? Whatever they be, for them I shall never be able to relish entirely any Devonshire scenery—Homer is fine, Achilles is fine, Diomed is fine, Shakspeare is fine, Hamlet is fine, Lear is fine, but dwindled Englishmen are not fine. Where too the women are so passable, and have such English names, such as Ophelia, Cordelia etc. that they should have such Paramours or rather Imparamours—As forthem, I cannot in thought help wishing, as did the cruel Emperor, that they had but one head, and I might cut it off to deliver them from any horrible Courtesy they may do their undeserving countrymen, I wonder I meet with no born monsters—O Devonshire, last night I thought the moon had dwindled in heaven——
I have never had your Sermon from Wordsworth, but Mr. Dilke lent it me. You know my ideas about Religion. I do not think myself more in the right than other people, and that nothing in this world is proveable. I wish I could enter into all your feelings on the subject, merely for one short 10 minutes, and give you a page or two to your liking. I am sometimes so very sceptical as to think Poetry itself a mere Jack o’ Lantern to amuse whoever may chance to be struck with its brilliance. As tradesmen say everything is worth what it will fetch, so probably every mental pursuit takes its reality and worth from the ardour of the pursuer—being in itself a Nothing. Ethereal things may at least be thus real, divided under three heads—Things real—things semireal—and nothings. Things real, such as existences of Sun moon and Stars—and passages of Shakspeare.—Things semireal, such as love, the Clouds etc., which require a greeting of the Spirit to make them wholly exist—and Nothings, which are made great and dignified by an ardent pursuit—which, by the by, stamp the Burgundy mark on the bottles of our minds, insomuch as they are able to “consecrate whate’er they look upon.” I have written a sonnet here of a somewhat collateral nature—so don’t imagine it an “apropos des bottes”—
Four Seasons fill the measure of the year;There are four seasons in the mind of Man:He hath his lusty Spring, when Fancy clearTakes in all beauty with an easy span:He has his Summer, when luxuriouslyHe chews the honied cud of fair Spring thoughts,Till in his Soul, dissolv’d, they come to bePart of himself: He hath his Autumn PortsAnd havens of repose, when his tired wingsAre folded up, and he content to look[52]On Mists in idleness—to let fair thingsPass by unheeded as a threshold brook.He has his winter too of Pale misfeature,Or else he would forego his mortal nature.
Aye, this may be carried—but what am I talking of?—it is an old maxim of mine, and of course must be well known, that every point of thought is the Centre of an intellectual world. The two uppermost thoughts in a Man’s mind are the two poles of his world—he revolves on them, and everything is Southward or Northward to him through their means.—We take but three steps from feathers to iron.—Now, my dear fellow, I must once for all tell you I have not one idea of the truth of any of my speculations—I shall never be a reasoner, because I care not to be in the right, when retired from bickering and in a proper philosophical temper. So you must not stare if in any future letter, I endeavour to prove that Apollo, as he had catgut strings to his lyre, used a cat’s paw as a pecten—and further from said Pecten’s reiterated and continual teasing came the termhen-pecked. My Brother Tom desires to be remembered to you; he has just this moment had a spitting of blood, poor fellow—Remember me to Gleig and Whitehead.
Your affectionate friendJohn Keats.
Teignmouth, Saturday [March 14, 1818].
Dear Reynolds—I escaped being blown over and blown under and trees and house being toppled on me.—I have since hearing of Brown’s accident had an aversion to a dose of parapet, and being also a lover of antiquitiesI would sooner have a harmless piece of Herculaneum sent me quietly as a present than ever so modern a chimney-pot tumbled on to my head—Being agog to see some Devonshire, I would have taken a walk the first day, but the rain would not let me; and the second, but the rain would not let me; and the third, but the rain forbade it. Ditto 4—ditto 5—ditto—so I made up my Mind to stop indoors, and catch a sight flying between the showers: and, behold I saw a pretty valley—pretty cliffs, pretty Brooks, pretty Meadows, pretty trees, both standing as they were created, and blown down as they are uncreated—The green is beautiful, as they say, and pity it is that it is amphibious—mais!but alas! the flowers here wait as naturally for the rain twice a day as the Mussels do for the Tide; so we look upon a brook in these parts as you look upon a splash in your Country. There must be something to support this—aye, fog, hail, snow, rain, Mist blanketing up three parts of the year. This Devonshire is like Lydia Languish, very entertaining when it smiles, but cursedly subject to sympathetic moisture. You have the sensation of walking under one great Lamplighter: and you can’t go on the other side of the ladder to keep your frock clean, and cosset your superstition. Buy a girdle—put a pebble in your mouth—loosen your braces—for I am going among scenery whence I intend to tip you the Damosel Radcliffe—I’ll cavern you, and grotto you, and waterfall you, and wood you, and water you, and immense-rock you, and tremendous-sound you, and solitude you. I’ll make a lodgment on your glacis by a row of Pines, and storm your covered way with bramble Bushes. I’ll have at you with hip and haw small-shot, and cannonade you with Shingles—I’ll be witty upon salt-fish, and impede your cavalry with clotted cream. But ah Coward! to talk at this rate to a sick man, or, I hope, to one that was sick—for I hope by this you stand on your right foot. If you are not—that’s all,—I intend to cut all sick people if they do not make up their minds to cut Sickness—a fellow to whom I have acomplete aversion, and who strange to say is harboured and countenanced in several houses where I visit—he is sitting now quite impudent between me and Tom—He insults me at poor Jem Rice’s—and you have seated him before now between us at the Theatre, when I thought he looked with a longing eye at poor Kean. I shall say, once for all, to my friends generally and severally, cut that fellow, or I cut you—
I went to the Theatre here the other night, which I forgot to tell George, and got insulted, which I ought to remember to forget to tell any Body; for I did not fight, and as yet have had no redress—“Lie thou there, sweetheart!”[53]I wrote to Bailey yesterday, obliged to speak in a high way, and a damme who’s afraid—for I had owed him so long; however, he shall see I will be better in future. Is he in town yet? I have directed to Oxford as the better chance. I have copied my fourth Book, and shall write the Preface soon. I wish it was all done; for I want to forget it and make my mind free for something new—Atkins the Coachman, Bartlett the Surgeon, Simmons the Barber, and the Girls over at the Bonnet-shop, say we shall now have a month of seasonable weather—warm, witty, and full of invention—Write 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, youwill find it a long letter, and see written in the Air above you,
Your most affectionate friendJohn Keats.
Remember me to all. Tom’s remembrances to you.
Teignmouth, Saturday Morn [March 21, 1818].
My dear Haydon—In sooth, I hope you are not too sanguine about that seal—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.[54]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 good behaviour. I have enjoyed the most delightful Walks these three fine days beautiful enough to make me content.
Here all the summer could I stay,For there’s Bishop’s teignAnd King’s teignAnd Coomb at the clear teign head—Where close by the streamYou may have your creamAll spread upon barley bread.There’s arch BrookAnd there’s larch BrookBoth turning many a mill;And cooling the drouthOf the salmon’s mouth,And fattening his silver gill.There is Wild wood,A Mild hoodTo the sheep on the lea o’ the down,Where the golden furze,With its green, thin spurs,Doth catch at the maiden’s gown.There is Newton marshWith its spear grass harsh—A pleasant summer levelWhere the maidens sweetOf the Market Street,Do meet in the dusk to revel.There’s the Barton richWith dyke and ditchAnd hedge for the thrush to live inAnd the hollow treeFor the buzzing beeAnd a bank for the wasp to hive in.And O, and OThe daisies blowAnd the primroses are waken’d,And the violets whiteSit in silver plight,And the green bud’s as long as the spike end.Then who would goInto dark Soho,And chatter with dack’d hair’d critics,When he can stayFor the new-mown hay,And startle the dappled Prickets?
I know not if this rhyming fit has done anything—it will be safe with you if worthy to put among my Lyrics. Here’s some doggrel for you—Perhaps you would like a bit of b——hrell—
Where be ye going, you Devon Maid?And what have you there in the Basket?Ye tight little fairy just fresh from the dairy,Will ye give me some cream if I ask it?I love your Meads, and I love your flowers,And I love your junkets mainly,But ’hind the door I love kissing more,O look not so disdainly.I love your hills, and I love your dales,And I love your flocks a-bleating—But O, on the heather to lie together,With both our hearts a-beating!I’ll put your Basket all safe in a nook,Your shawl I hang up on the willow,And we will sigh in the daisy’s eyeAnd kiss on a grass green pillow.
How does the work go on? I should like to bring out my “Dentatus”[55]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 shouldn’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.
Yours affectionatelyJohn Keats.
Remember me to all we know.
Teignmouth, Saturday Morn [March 21, 1818].
My dear Sirs—I had no idea of your getting on so fast—I thought of bringing 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 sincerelyJohn 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!
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, verymuch 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, forthe 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 intellect 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.... 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 friendJohn Keats.