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I am confined at Hampstead with a sore throat; but I do not expect it will keep me above two or three days. I intended to have been in Town yesterday but feel obliged to be careful a little while. I am in general so careless of these trifles, that they teaze me for Months, when a few days care is all that is necessary. I shall not neglect any chance of an endeavour to let you return to Schoolnor to procure you a Visit to Mrs. Dilke's which I have great fears about. Write me if you can find time-and also get a few lines ready for George as the Post sails next Wednesday.

Your affectionate Brother

John

As the 31st of December 1818 was a Thursday, this letter belongs

to the 30th.

LXXVIII.

To BENJAMIN ROBERT HAYDON.

My dear Haydon,

Wentworth Place.

I had an engagement to day-and it is so fine a morning that I cannot put it off-I will be with you tomorrow-when we will thank the Gods, though you have bad eyes and I am idle.

I regret more than anything the not being able to dine with you today. I have had several movements that way-but then I should disappoint one who has been my true friend. I will be with you tomorrow morning and stop all day—we will hate the profane vulgar and make us Wings.

God bless you

J. Keats

This undated letter is inserted in Haydon's journal next to that postmarked the 23rd of December 1818; and on the reverse of the same leaf, immediately before the entries for the 31st of December 1818, is fastened the following letter :

My dear Keats,

I am gone out to walk in a positive agony-my eyes are so weak I can do nothing to day-if I did to day I should be totally incapacitated to-morrow-therefore you will confer a great favor on me to come to-morrow instead between ten and eleven-as I shall walk about all day in the air, and perhaps will call on you before three-I hope in God, by rest to day-to be quite adequate to it tomorrow.

Friday Morning

Yours most affectly

dear Keats
B. R. Haydon

Perhaps Haydon's letter should be assigned to Friday the 1st of January 1819, and Keats's to the following day.

LXXIX.

To BENJAMIN ROBERT HAYDON.

Wentworth Place

Monday Aft

My dear Haydon,

I have been out this morning, and did not therefore see your note till this minute, or I would have gone to town directly—it is now too late for to day. I will be in town early tomorrow, and trust I shall be able to lend you assistance noon or night. I was struck with the improvement in the architectural part of your Picture—and, now I think on it, I cannot help wondering you should have had it so poor, especially after the Solomon. Excuse this dry bones of a note: for though my pen may grow cold, I should be sorry my Life should freeze

Your affectionate friend

John Keats

This letter is wafered into Haydon's journal together with the following to which it seems to be a reply. Haydon's, dated the 7th of January 1819 (a Thursday) was perhaps kept over till the following Monday, in which case the probable date of Keats's reply is the 11th of January 1819.

My dear Keats

I now frankly tell you I will accept your friendly offer; I hope you will pardon my telling you so, but I am disappointed where I expected not to be and my only hope for the concluding difficulties of my Picture lie[s] in you. I leave this in case you are not at home. Do let me hear from you how you are, and when I shall get my bond ready for you, for that is the best way for me to do, at two years.

Jany. 7th 1819.

I am dear Keats

Your affectionate Friend

B. R. Haydon

LXXX.

To FANNY KEATS.

Rd. Abbey's Esqre.,

Walthamstow.

Wentworth Place

My dear Fanny,

I send this to Walthamstow for fear you should not be at Pancras Lane when I call tomorrow-before going into Hampshire for a few days-I will not be more I assure you-You may think how disappointed I am in not being able to see you more and spend more time with you than I do but how can it be helped? The thought is a continual vexation to me-and often hinders me from reading and composing-Write to me as often as you can—and believe me

Your affectionate Brother

John

The postmark of this undated letter is illegible; but the subject points to the early part of 1819-probably to January.

LXXXI.

To BENJAMIN ROBERT HAYDON.

My dear Haydon,

Wentworth Place

We are very unlucky-I should have stopped to dine with you, but I knew I should not have been able to leave you in time for my plaguy sore throat; which is getting well.

I shall have a little trouble in procuring the Money and a great ordeal to go through-no trouble indeed to any one else—or ordeal either. I mean I shall have to go to town some thrice, and stand in the Bank an hour or two-to me worse than any thing in Dante-I should have less chance with the people around me than Orpheus

This letter has no date or postmark, but clearly follows very closely on Haydon's letter of the 7th of January 1819, and precedes the following note dated the 14th of January 1819 which quotes the words "agonie ennuyeuse":—

My dear Keats,

14th January, 1819.

Your letter was every thing that is kind, affectionate and friendly. I depend on it; it has relieved my anxious mind.-The "agonie ennuyeuse" you talk of be assured is nothing but the intense searching of a glorious spirit, and the disappointment it feels at its first contact with the muddy world-but it will go off-and bye and bye you will shine through it with "fresh A[r]gent "—don't let it injure your health; for two years I felt that agony.-Write me before that I may be home when you come.

God bless you my dear Keats!

Yours ever

B. R. Haydon.

The words given above as "fresh Argent" are not clearly written in the manuscript in Haydon's journal; but I think a reference was intended to one of the many instances in which Keats uses the word argent.

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