7

6

Published in the 1817 volume. Lord Houghton states that this sonnet was the means of introducing Keats to Mr. Leigh Hunt's society. Mr. Cowden Clarke had brought some of his young friend's verses and read them aloud. Mr. Horace Smith, who happened to be there, was struck with the last six lines, especially the penultimate, saying "what a well condensed expression!" and Keats was shortly after introduced to the literary circle.' This would appear to fix the date as not later than the summer of 1815.

KEEN, fitful gusts are whisp'ring here and there

Among the bushes half leafless, and dry ; The stars look very cold about the sky, And I have many miles on foot to fare. Yet feel I little of the cool bleak air,

Or of the dead leaves rustling drearily, Or of those silver lamps that burn on high,

Or of the distance from home's pleasant lair:

For I am brimful of the friendliness

That in a little cottage I have found; Of fair-hair'd Milton's eloquent distress, And all his love for gentle Lycid drown'd; Of lovely Laura in her light green dress, And faithful Petrarch gloriously crown'd.

SPENSERIAN STANZA

WRITTEN AT THE CLOSE OF CANTO II. BOOK V. OF THE FAERIE QUEENE'

Given by Lord Houghton in Life, Letters and Literary Remains, who comments as follows: His sympathies were very much on the side of the revolutionary Giant, who "undertook for to repair" the "realms and nations run awry," and to suppress "tyrants that make men subject to their law," "and lordings curbe that commons over-aw," while he grudged the legitimate victory, as he rejected the conservative philosophy, of the "righteous Artegall and his comrade, the fierce defender of privilege and order. And he expressed in this ex post facto prophecy, his conviction of the

ultimate triumph of freedom and equality by the power of transmitted knowledge.' No date is assigned, and the verse may as well be placed in the early period of Keats's acquaintance with Spenser and friendship with Leigh Hunt.

IN after-time, a sage of mickle lore Yclep'd Typographus, the Giant took, And did refit his limbs as heretofore, And made him read in many a learned book,

ON FIRST LOOKING INTO CHAPMAN'S HOMER

It was Charles Cowden Clarke who was with Keats when the friends made the acquaintance of this translation of Homer by the Elizabethan poet. The two young men had sat up nearly all one night in the summer of 1815 in Clarke's lodging, reading from a folio volume of the book which they had borrowed. Keats left for his own lodgings at dawn, and when Clarke came down to breakfast the next morn

him,

sent him.

self with Keats: Keats and I, though about the same age, and both inclined to literature, were in many respects as different as two individuals could be. He enjoyed good health – a fine flow of animal spirits was fond of company - could amuse himself admirably with the frivolities of life-and had great confidence in himself. I, on the other hand, was languid and melancholy-fond of repose -thoughtful beyond my years and diffident to the last degree.' The epistle is dated November, 1815, in the volume of 1817, where it is the first of a group of three epistles with the motto from Browne's Britannia's Pastorals:

Among the rest a shepherd (though but young
Yet hartned to his pipe) with all the skill
His few yeeres could, began to fit his quill.

SWEET are the pleasures that to verse belong,

And doubly sweet a brotherhood in song; Nor can remembrance, Mathew! bring to view

A fate more pleasing, a delight more true Than that in which the brother Poets joy'd, Who, with combined powers, their wit employ'd

To raise a trophy to the drama's muses. The thought of this great partnership diffuses

Over the genius-loving heart, a feeling Of all that's high, and great, and good, and healing.

to

Too partial friend! fain would I follow thee

Past each horizon of fine poesy; Fain would I echo back each pleasant note As o'er Sicilian seas, clear anthems float 'Mong the light skimming gondolas far parted,

Just when the sun his farewell beam has darted

But 't is impossible; far different cares