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"Rigs of Barley" seemed always to me but a few strips of green on a cold hill-Oh, prejudice!—It was as rich as Devon, I endeavoured to drink in the prospect, that I might spin it out to you, as the silk-worm makes silk from mulberry leaves. I cannot recollect it. Besides all the beauty, there were the mountains of Annan Isle, black and huge over the sea. We came down upon everything suddenly; there were in our way the "bonny Doon," with the brig that Tam o' Shanter crossed, Kirk Alloway, Burns's Cottage, and the Brigs of Ayr. First we stood upon the Bridge across the Doon, surrounded by every phantasy of green in tree, meadow, and hill: the stream of the Doon, as a farmer told us, is covered with trees" from head to foot." You know those beautiful heaths, so fresh against the weather of a summer's evening; there was one stretching along behind the trees.

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I wish I knew always the humour my friends would be in at opening a letter of mine, to suit it to them as nearly as possible. I could always find an egg-shell for melancholy, and, as for merriment, a witty humour will turn anything to account. My head is sometimes in such a whirl in considering the million likings and antipathies of our moments, that I can get into no settled strain in my letters. My wig! Burns and sentimentality coming across you and Frank Floodgate' in the office.

1 The illiterate Scot, and at times the Scot not wholly illiterate will even describe a smoked salmon as "split from head till foot."

2 In elucidation of this witticism, Mr. Dilke makes a very interesting note. After recording that Reynolds was originally a clerk in an Insurance Office in Serjeant's Inn, he says-" Rice suggested that he should become a lawyer, and his relation Mr. Fladgatehimself a literary man in early life and editor of the 'Sun' newspaper-consented to receive him as an Articled Pupil, and dear

Oh, Scenery, that thou shouldst be crushed between two puns! As for them, I venture the rascalliest in the Scotch region. I hope Brown does not put them in his journal if he does, I must sit on the cutty-stool all next winter. We went to Kirk Alloway. "A prophet is no prophet in his own country." We went to the Cottage and took some whisky. I wrote a sonnet for the mere sake of writing some lines under the roof: they are so

generous noble James Rice-the best, and in his quaint way one of the wittiest and wisest men I ever knew-paid the fee or stamp or whatever it is called-about 110 I believe-and promised if he ever succeeded to his father's business to take him in partner. He not only kept his word, but in a few years gave up the business to him. Reynolds unhappily threw away this certain fortune. The Frank Fladgate here mentioned was Mr. Fladgate's eldest son, then Articled to his father." Mr. Dilke adds that Lady Dryden left Frank Fladgate her fortune. To return for a moment to Reynolds-I presume it was on the occasion above explained that he wrote in the copy of Shakespeare's Poems which he afterwards gave to Keats (and in which Keats wrote his last sonnet) the following charming sonnet entitled

FAREWELL TO THE MUSES.

I have no chill despondence that I am

Self banished from those rolls of honoring men

That keep a temperate eye on airy Fame

And write songs to her with a golden pen.

I do not wail because the Muses keep

Their secrets on the top of Helicon

Nor do I in my wayward moments weep

That from my youth Romance is past and gone,
My boat is trimm'd-my sail is set-And I

Shall coast the shallows of the tide of Time

And rest me happily-where others lie,

Who pass oblivious days. No feelings climb
Ambitiously within me. Sweet Farewell

Be to those Nymphs that on the old Hill dwell.

14 Feb. 1818.

VOL. III.

N

J. H. R.

bad I cannot transcribe them.' The man at the cottage was a great bore with his anecdotes. I hate the rascal. His life consists in fuzy, fuzzy, fuzziest. He drinks glasses, five for the quarter, and twelve for the hour; he is a mahogany-faced old jackass who knew Burns he ought to have been kicked for having spoken to him. He calls himself "a curious old bitch," but he is a flat old dog. I should like to employ Caliph Vathek to kick him. Oh, the flummery of a birthplace! Cant! cant! cant! It is enough to give a spirit the guts-ache. Many a true word, they say, is spoken in jest-this may be because his gab hindered my sublimity: the flat dog made me write a flat sonnet. My dear Reynolds, I cannot write about scenery and visitings. Fancy is indeed less than a present palpable reality, but it is greater than remembrance. You would lift your eyes from Homer only to see close before you the real Isle of Tenedos. You would rather read Homer afterwards than remember yourself. One song of Burns's is of more worth to you than all I could think for a whole year in his native country. His misery is a dead weight upon the nimbleness of one's quill; I tried to forget itto drink toddy without any care-to write a merry sonnet-it won't do-he talked with bitches, he drank with blackguards; he was miserable. We can see horribly clear, in the works of such a man, his whole life, as if we were God's spies. What were his addresses to Jean in the latter part of his life? I should not speak so to you-Yet, why not? You are not in the same case -you are in the right path, and you shall not be deceived. I have spoken to you against marriage, but it was general. The prospect in those matters has been to

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me so blank, that I have not been unwilling to die. I would not now, for I have inducements to life-I must see my little nephews in America, and I must see you marry your lovely wife. My sensations are sometimes deadened for weeks together-but, believe me, I have more than once yearned for the time of your happiness to come, as much as I could for myself after the lips of Juliet. From the tenor of my occasional rhodomontade in chit-chat, you might have been deceived concerning me in these points. Upon my soul, I have been getting more and more close to you every day, ever since I knew you, and now one of the first pleasures I look to is your happy marriage—the more, since I have felt the pleasure of loving a sister-in-law. I did not think it possible to become so much attached in so short a time. Things like these, and they are real, have made me resolve to have a care of my health-you must be as careful.

The rain has stopped us to-day at the end of a dozen miles, yet we hope to see Loch Lomond the day after to-morrow. I will piddle out my information, as Rice says, next winter, at any time when a substitute is wanted for Vingt-un. We bear the fatigue very well: twenty miles a day in general. A cloud came over us in getting up Skiddaw-I hope to be more lucky in Ben Lomond and more lucky still in Ben Nevis. What I think you would enjoy is, poking about ruins, sometimes Abbey, sometimes Castle.

Tell my friends I do all I can for them, that is, drink their healths in Toddy. Perhaps I may have some lines, by and by, to send you fresh, on your own letter.

Your affectionate friend

John Keats

LIII.

To THOMAS KEATS.

Well Walk, Hampstead.

Belantree, July 10

[Postmark, Glasgow, 14 July 1818].

Ah! ken ye what I met the day

Out oure the Mountains

A coming down by craggi[e]s grey

An mossie fountains

A[h] goud hair'd Marie yeve I pray
Ane minute's guessing-

For that I met upon the way

Is past expressing.

As I stood where a rocky brig

A torrent crosses

I spied upon a misty rig

A troup o' Horses

And as they trotted down the glen

I sped to meet them

To see if I might know the Men

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Although the recovery of this letter is fortunate, it would have been more so had it occurred in time to admit of the opening verses taking their place among the rest of those included in the Scotch tour series in Volume II. I presume Keats's way of spelling Ballantrae has no authority; but I leave the place-name as I find it.

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