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cism; to promote digestion and economize 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.

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rable.

I am anxious you should find this Preface toleIf there is an affectation in it 'tis natural to Do let the printer's devil cook it, and let me be as "the casing air."

me.

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

1 Mr. Dilke suggests that the reference may be to the Kingston whom Keats had met at Horace Smith's (see page 99), and adds "If so he was I think a Commissioner of Stamps."

a region of mists, game laws, indemnity bills, &c., 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 covers the whole face of the isle with green. So it ought, I'm sure.

I should still like the Dedication simply, as I said in my last.'

I wanted to send you a few songs, written in your favorite Devon. I cannot be! Rain, rain, rain! I am going this morning to take a facsimile of a letter of Nelson's very much to his honour; you will be greatly pleased when you see it, in about a week.

What a spite it is one cannot get out! The little way I went yesterday, I found a lane banked on each side with a store of primroses, while the earlier bushes are beginning to leaf.

I shall hear a good account of you soon.

Your affectionate friend
John Keats

'Keats's insistence on this point may be in requisition some of these days. The late Gabriel Rossetti was anxious to see the original Dedication substituted for the final and simpler one; and other critics of the future may have the same preference, which I am sure Rossetti would have been the last to push to execution had he noticed these passages on the subject.

XLIV.

To JOHN HAMILTON REYNOLDS.

Teignmouth,

My dear Reynolds,

27 April, 1818.

It is an awful while since you have heard from me. I hope I may not be punished, when I see you well, and so anxious as you always are for me, with the remembrance of my so seldom writing when you were so horribly confined. The most unhappy hours in our lives are those in which we recollect times past to our own blushing. If we are immortal, that must be the Hell. If I must be immortal, I hope it will be after having taken a little of " that watery labyrinth," in order to forget some of my school-boy days, and others since those.

I have heard from George, at different times, how slowly you were recovering. It is a tedious thing; but all medical men will tell you how far a very gradual amendment is preferable. You will be strong after this, never fear.

We are here still enveloped in clouds. I lay awake last night listening to the rain, with a sense of being drowned and rotted like a grain of wheat. There is a continual courtesy between the heavens and the earth. The heavens rain down their unwelcomeness, and the earth sends it up again, to be returned to-morrow.

Tom has taken a fancy to a physician here, Dr. Turton, and, I think, is getting better; therefore I shall, perhaps, remain here some months. I have written to George for some books-shall learn Greek, and very likely Italian; and, in other ways, prepare myself to ask Hazlitt, in about

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a year's time, the best metaphysical road I can take. For, although I take Poetry to be chief, yet there is something else wanting to one who passes his life among books and thoughts on books. I long to feast upon old Homer as we have upon Shakspeare, and as I have lately upon Milton. If you understand Greek, and would read me passages now and then, explaining their meaning, 'twould be, from its mistiness, perhaps, a greater luxury than reading the thing one's self. I shall be happy when I can do the same for you.

I have written for my folio Shakspeare, in which there are the first few stanzas of my "Pot of Basil." I have the rest here, finished, and will copy the whole out fair shortly, and George will bring it you. The compliment is paid by us to Boccace, whether we publish or no: so there is content in this world.' Mine is short; you must be deliberate about yours: you must not think of it till many months after you are quite well-then put your passion to it, and I shall be bound up with you in the shadows of mind, as we are in our matters of human life. Perhaps a stanza or two will not be too foreign to your sickness.

Give my love to your mother and sisters. Remember me to the Butlers-not forgetting Sarah.

Your affectionate friend,

John Keats.

'See Volume II, pages 43-4. The stanzas transcribed for Rey

nolds appear to have been XII, XIII, and xxx.

XLV.

To JOHN TAYLOR.

Teignmouth,

27 April 1818.

My dear Taylor,

I think I did wrong to leave to you all the trouble of " Endymion." But I could not help it then-another time I shall be more bent to all sorts of troubles and disagreeables. Young men, for some time, have an idea that such a thing as happiness is to be had, and therefore are extremely impatient under any unpleasant restraining. In time, however,—of such stuff is the world about them,—they know better, and instead of striving from uneasiness, greet it as an habitual sensation, a pannier which is to weigh upon them through life. And in proportion to my disgust at the task is my sense of your kindness and anxiety. The book pleased me much. It is very free from faults; and, although there are one or two words I should wish replaced, I see in many places an improvement greatly to the purpose.

I was proposing to travel over the North this summer. There is but one thing to prevent me. I know nothing -I have read nothing—and I mean to follow Solomon's directions, "Get learning-get understanding." I find earlier days are gone by-I find that I can have no enjoyment in the world but continual drinking of know·ledge. I find there is no worthy pursuit but the idea of doing some good to the world. Some do it with their society; some with their wit; some with their benevolence; some with a sort of power of conferring pleasure and good humour on all they meet-and in a thousand ways, all dutiful to the command of great Nature. There

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