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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 Post-man to Exeter at the same time with this letter. Adieu.

most welcome to him. Bailey's in town for a few days, on business for Glegg-I have not seen him.-Mrs. Scott desires her compliments to you and Tom. I have repeatedly called on Taylor and Hessey and have never found them at home, or you should long since have known the progress of your book. Brown has I understand written to you and given you the pleasant information that the printers are in immediate want of the fourth book and preface. By the time you have received this I have no doubt but T. and¡H. will have received them.-The inclosed 20 pounds No. 834 dated 3rd Feby-1818, will reach you before you are quite aground. I am about paying yours as well as Tom's bills, of which I shall keep regular accounts and for the sake of justice and a future proper understanding I intend calculating the probable amount Tom and I are indebted to you, something of this kind must be done, or at the end of two or three years we shall be all at sixes and sevens. Let me know when you want money. I have paid Hodgkinson who desires his best rem[embrance]s.—I'll write Tom soon-give my love to him-rem[embrance]s to Miss M and C-and love to the Miss I's-Miss Wylie as usual desires her respects to you and best wishes to Tom-R Draper has been teazing throughout the writing of this to my great annoyance—.

Good bye for the present

Your most affectionate Brother
George.

XXXIX.

To JOHN HAMILTON REYNOLDS.

My dear Reynolds,

Teignmouth,

25 March 1818.

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," and I wish you may be pleased with my remembrance of it. 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.

The rain is come on again.

Your affectionate friend

John Keats

The poem which this little note was written to accompany is the charming Epistle to John Hamilton Reynolds printed at pages 266-70 of the second volume. It is by far the most notable of Keats's Poetical Epistles, as indeed it naturally should be, being so much the latest of them. As regards Claude's picture of The Enchanted Castle, see the foot-note to the poem. The close of the piece is in a more thoughtful vein than usual, and might afford a useful argument to any one who should care to be at the pains of justifying Mr. Matthew Arnold's claim for Keats to the quality of "high seriousness" in his criticism of life.

My dear Rice,

XL.

To JAMES RICE.

Teignmouth,

25 March 1818.

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 a 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 etherealized 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 backgarden, 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 un

earthly, and cannot, for his life, keep in the check-reinor 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, 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 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 gormandizing, might have been all wise men. Now for as much 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 nice 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. 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, &c. &c.

Your sincere friend

John Keats

XLI.

To BENJAMIN ROBERT HAYDON.

Lisson Grove North,

Paddington, Middx.

Wednesday

[Postmarks, Teignmouth, and 10 April 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 favorable 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

(XLI) I presume this letter was written on the 9th of April, which was a Wednesday.

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