"An argument that he is plucked, when hither
He sends so poor a pinion of his wing."

Then again Enobarbus :

"men's judgments are

A parcel of their fortunes; and things outward
Do draw the inward quality after them,
To suffer all alike."

The following applies well to Bertrand :

"Yet he that can endure

To follow with allegiance a fallen Lord,
Does conquer him, that did his master conquer,
And earns a place i' the story."

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'Tis good, too, that the Duke of Wellington has a good word or so in the Examiner ; a man ought to have the fame he deserves; and I begin to think that detracting from him is the same thing as from Wordsworth. I wish he (Wordsworth) had a little more taste, and did not in that respect deal in Lieutenantry." You should have heard from me before this; but, in the first place, I did not like to do so, before I had got a little way in the first Book, and in the next, as G. told me you were going to write, I delayed till I heard from you. So now in the name of Shakespeare, Raphael, and all our Saints, I commend you to the care of Heaven.

Your everlasting friend,

JOHN KEATS.

In the early part of May, it appears from the following extract of a letter to Mr. Hunt, * written from Margate, that the sojourn in the Isle of Wight had not answered his expectations: the solitude, or rather apany of self, was too much for him,

the company

"I went to the Isle of Wight, thought so much about poetry, so long together, that I could not get to sleep at night; and moreover, I know not how it is, I could not get wholesome food. By this means, in a week or so, I became not over capable in my upper stories, and set off pell-mell for Margate, at least a hundred and fifty miles, because, forsooth, I fancied I should like my old lodgings here, and could continue to do without trees. Another thing, I was too much in solitude, and consequently was obliged to be in continual burning of thought as an only resource. However, Tom is with me at present, and we are very comfortable. We intend, though, to get among some trees. How have you got on among them? How are the nymphs?—I suppose they have led you a fine dance. Where are you now?

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'I have asked myself so often why I should be a Poet more than other men, seeing how great a thing it is, how great things are to be gained by it, what a thing to be in the mouth of Fame, that at last the

* Given entire in the first volume of " Lord Byron and some of his Contemporaries."

idea has grown so monstrously beyond my seeming power of attainment, that the other day I nearly consented with myself to drop into a Phaeton. Yet 'tis a disgrace to fail even in a huge attempt, and at this moment I drive the thought from me. I begun my poem about a fortnight since, and have done some every day, except travelling ones. Perhaps I may have done a good deal for the time, but it appears such a pin's point to me, that I will not copy any out. When I consider that so many of these pin-points go to form a bodkin-point (God send I end not my life with a bare bodkin, in its modern sense), and that it requires a thousand bodkins to make a spear bright enough to throw any light to posterity, I see nothing but continual up-hill journeying. Nor is there anything more unpleasant (it may come among the thousand and one) than to be so journeying and to miss the goal at last. But I intend to whistle all these cogitations into the sea, where I hope they will breed storms violent enough to block up all exit from Russia.

"Does Shelley go on telling strange stories of the deaths of kings?'* Tell him there are strange i

* Mr. Hunt mentions that Shelley was fond of quoting the passage in Shakespeare, and of applying it in an unexpected manner. Travelling with him once to town in the Hampstead stage, in which their only companion was an old lady, who sat

This letter is signed "John Keats alias Junkets," an appellation given him in play upon his name, and in allusion to his friends of Fairy-land.

The poem here begun was "Endymion." In the first poem of the early volume some lines occur showing that the idea had long been germinating in his fancy; and, how suggestive of a multitude of images is one such legend to an earnest and constructive mind!

"He was a poet, sure a lover too,

Who stood on Latmos' top, what time there blew
Soft breezes from the myrtle vale below;

And brought, in faintness, solemn, sweet, and slow
A hymn from Dian's temple-while upswelling,
The incense went to her own starry dwelling.-
But, though her face was clear as infants' eyes,
Though she stood smiling o'er the sacrifice,

silent and stiff, after the English fashion, Shelley startled her into a look of the most ludicrous astonishment by saying abruptly,

"Hist!

For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground,

And tell strange stories of the deaths of kings."

The old lady looked on the coach floor, expecting them to take their seats accordingly.

The Poet wept at her so piteous fate,

Wept that such beauty should be desolate :
So, in fine wrath, some golden sounds he won,
And gave meek Cynthia her Endymion."

And the description of the effect of the union of the Poet and the Goddess on universal nature is

equal in vivacity and tenderness to anything in the maturer work.

"The evening weather was so bright and clear
That men of health were of unusual cheer,
Stepping like Homer at the trumpet's call,
Or young Apollo on the pedestal;
And lovely woman there is fair and warm,
As Venus looking sideways in alarm.
The breezes were ethereal and pure,
And crept through half-closed lattices, to cure
The languid sick; it cooled their fevered sleep,
And soothed them into slumbers full and deep.
Soon they awoke, clear-eyed, nor burnt with thirsting,
Nor with hot fingers, nor with temples bursting,
And springing up they met the wond'ring sight

Of their dear friends, nigh foolish with delight,
Who feel their arms and breasts, and kiss and stare,
And on their placid foreheads part the hair.
Young men and maidens at each other gazed
With hands held back and motionless, amazed
To see the brightness in each other's eyes;
And so they stood, filled with a sweet surprise,
Until their tongues were loosed in poesy :
Therefore no lover did of anguish die,
But the soft numbers, in that moment spoken,
Made silken ties, that never may be broken."