A little brook. The youth had long been viewing These pleasant things, and heaven was bedewing The mountain flowers, when his glad senses caught A trumpet's silver voice. Ah! it was fraught With many joys for him : the warder's ken Had found white coursers prancing in the glen: Friends very dear to him he soon will see; His spirit flies before him so completely. Of his proud horse's mane: he was withal It hard, and heavy steel: but that indeed In which a spirit new come from the skies 120 Might live, and show itself to human eyes. 'Tis the far-fam'd, the brave Sir Gondi bert, Said the good man to Calidore alert; Softly the breezes from the forest came, Grateful the incense from the lime-tree Mysterious, wild, the far heard trumpet's tone; While the young warrior with a step of Lovely the moon in ether, all alone: Sweet too the converse of these happy mortals, As that of busy spirits when the portals Are closing in the west; or that soft humming 160 We hear around when Hesperus is coming. EPISTLE TO CHARLES This epistle printed in the 1817 volume is there dated September, 1816, when Clarke was in his twenty-ninth year. He was by eight years Keats's senior, and he lived till his ninetieth year. OFT have you seen a swan superbly frowning, And with proud breast his own white shadow crowning; Sometimes I lost them, and then found again; You changed the foot-path for the grassy plain. No sooner had I stepp'd into these plea- In those still moments I have wish'd you ADDRESSED TO BENJAMIN ROBERT HAYDON Though the poem is thus headed in the 1817 volume, where it is dated November 18, 1816, it might as properly have the heading given it in Tom Keats's copybook: 'Written to his Brother Tom on his Birthday,' with the same date. SMALL, busy flames play through the freshlaid coals, And their faint cracklings o'er, our silence creep Like whispers of the household gods that keep A gentle empire o'er fraternal souls. And while, for rhymes, I search around the poles, Your eyes are fix'd, as in poetic sleep, Upon the lore so voluble and deep, That aye at fall of night our care condoles. This is your birth-day, Tom, and I rejoice That thus it passes smoothly, quietly: Many such eves of gently whisp❜ring noise May we together pass, and calmly try What are this world's true joys, -ere the great Voice, From its fair face, shall bid our spirits fly. ADDRESSED TO BENJAMIN ROBERT HAYDON The first of these two sonnets was sent by Keats with this brief note: November 20, 1816. My dear Sir- Last evening wrought me up, and I cannot forbear sending you the following.' In his prompt acknowledgment Haydon suggested the omission of the last four words in the penultimate line, and proposed sending the sonnet to Wordsworth. Keats re 333 plied on the same day as his first note: Your letter has filled me with a proud pleasure, and shall be kept by me as a stimulus to exertion I begin to fix my eye upon one horizon. My feelings entirely fall in with yours in regard to the Ellipsis, and I glory in it. The Idea of your sending it to Wordsworth put me out of breath. You know with what Reverence I would send my Well-wishes to him.' The presentation copy of the 1817 volume bears the inscription To W. Wordsworth with the Author's sincere Reverence.' Both sonnets were printed, but in the reverse order in the 1817 volume, and the ellipsis was preserved. I GREAT spirits now on earth are sojourning; He of the cloud, the cataract, the lake, Who on Helvellyn's summit, wide awake, Catches his freshness from Archangel's. wing: He of the rose, the violet, the spring, The social smile, the chain for Freedom's sake: And lo! whose steadfastness would never take A meaner sound than Raphael's whispering. And other spirits there are standing apart Upon the forehead of the age to come; These, these will give the world another heart, And other pulses. Hear ye not the hum Of mighty workings in the human mart? Listen awhile ye nations, and be dumb. II HIGHMINDEDNESS, a jealousy for good, A loving-kindness for the great man's fame, Dwells here and there with people of no name, In noisome alley, and in pathless wood: And where we think the truth least under stood, Oft may be found a 'singleness of aim,' That ought to frighten into hooded shame A money-mong'ring, pitiable brood. How glorious this affection for the cause Of steadfast genius, toiling gallantly! |