"Oh, it was all a joke, the writer meant nothing more than to be witty. He certainly thought there was much affectation in his Poetry, and he expressed his opinion only--It was done in the fair spirit of criticism."
"It was done in the Spirit of the Devil, Mr Blackwood. So if a young man is guilty of affectation while he is walking the streets it is fair in another Person because he dislikes it to come and knock him down."
"No," says B., "but a poet challenges public opinion by printing his book, but I suppose you would have them not criticized at all?"
"I certainly think they are punished enough by neglect and by the failure of their hopes and to me it seems very cruel to abuse a man merely because he cannot give us as much pleasure as he wishes. But you go even beyond his ...(?) you strike a man when he is down. He gets a violent blow from the Quarterly--and then you begin."
"I beg your pardon," says B., "we were the first."
"I think not, but if you were the first, you continued it after, for that truly diabolical thrust about the 50 appeared after the critique in the Quarterly."
"You mistake that altogether," said B., "the writer does not like the c.o.c.kney School, so he went on joking Mr K. about it."
"Why should not the manners of gentlemen continue to regulate their conduct when they are writing of each other as much as when they are in conversation? No man would insult Mr Keats in this manner in his company, and what is the difference between writing and speaking of a person except that the written attack is the more base from being made anonymously and therefore at no personal risk.--I feel regard for Mr Keats as a man of real Genius, a Gentleman, nay more, one of the gentlest of Human Beings. He does not resent these things himself, he merely says of his Opponents "They don"t know me." Now this mildness(?) his friends feel the more severely when they see him ill used. But this feeling is not confined to them. I am happy to say that the Public Interest is awakened to the sense of the Injustice which has been done him and the attempts to ruin him will have in the end a contrary effect." Here I turned the conversation to another subject by asking B. if he read the _Abbot_, and in about 10 minutes more he made his Exit with a formal Bow and a Good Morning.
The above is the Substance and as clearly as possible the words, I made use of. His replies were a little more copious than I have stated but to the same effect. I have written this conversation down on the day it took place because I suspect some allusion may hereafter be made to it in the Mag. and I fully expect that whatever Books we publish will be received with reference to the feeling it is calculated to excite in the bosoms of these freebooting....[7]
In the upshot, the Blackwood critics took no direct notice of the _Lamia_ volume at all, but made occasion during the autumn to say their new say about Keats in a review of Sh.e.l.ley"s _Prometheus Unbound_. This time the hand is unmistakably that of Wilson. For the last year or more Wilson, following a hint given him by De Quincey, had chosen to take Sh.e.l.ley boisterously under his patronage as a poet of true genius, for whom scarcely any praise would be too high could he only be weaned from his impious opinions. Now, after reb.u.t.ting a current and really gratuitous charge that the magazine praised Sh.e.l.ley from the knowledge that he was a man of means and family, and denounced Hunt and Keats because they were poor and struggling, the critic bl.u.s.ters characteristically on, in a strain half apologetic in one breath and in the next as odiously insolent as ever:--
As for Mr Keats, we are informed that he is in a very bad state of health, and that his friends attribute a great deal of it to the pain he has suffered from the critical castigation his _Endymion_ drew down on him in this magazine. If it be so, we are most heartily sorry for it, and have no hesitation in saying, that had we suspected that young author, of being so delicately nerved, we should have administered our reproof in a much more lenient shape and style. The truth is, we from the beginning saw marks of feeling and power in Mr Keats"s verses, which made us think it very likely, he might become a real poet in England, provided he could be persuaded to give up all the tricks of c.o.c.kneyism, and forswear for ever the thin potations of Mr Leigh Hunt.
We, therefore, rated him as roundly as we decently could do, for the flagrant affectations of those early productions of his. In the last volume he has published we find more beauties than in the former, both of language and of thought, but we are sorry to say, we find abundance of the same absurd affectations also, and superficial conceits, which first displeased us in his writings;--and which we are again very sorry to say, must in our opinion, if persisted in, utterly and entirely prevent Mr Keats from ever taking his place among the pure and cla.s.sical poets of his mother tongue. It is quite ridiculous to see how the vanity of these c.o.c.kneys makes them overrate their own importance, even in the eyes of us, that have always expressed such plain unvarnished contempt for them, and who do feel for them all, a contempt too calm and profound, to admit of any admixture of anything like anger or personal spleen. We should just as soon think of being wroth with vermin, independently of their coming into our apartment, as we should of having any feelings at all about any of these people, other than what are excited by seeing them in the shape of authors.
Many of them, considered in any other character than that of authors, are, we have no doubt, ent.i.tled to be considered as very worthy people in their own way. Mr Hunt is said to be a very amiable man in his own sphere, and we believe him to be so willingly. Mr Keats we have often heard spoken of in terms of great kindness, and we have no doubt his manners and feelings are calculated to make his friends love him. But what has all this to do with our opinion of their poetry? What, in the name of wonder, does it concern us, whether these men sit among themselves, with mild or with sulky faces, eating their mutton steaks, and drinking their porter at Highgate, Hampstead, or Lisson Green?...
Last of all, what should forbid us to announce our opinion, that Mr Sh.e.l.ley, as a man of genius, is not merely superior, either to Mr Hunt, or to Mr Keats, but altogether out of their sphere, and totally incapable of ever being brought into the most distant comparison with either of them.
The critical utterance on Keats"s side likely to tell most with general readers was that of Jeffrey in the _Edinburgh Review_. A year earlier Keats had written from Winchester expressing impatience at what he thought the cowardice of the Edinburgh in keeping silence as to _Endymion_ in face of the Quarterly attack. "They do not know what to make of it, and they will not praise it for fear. They are as shy of it as I should be of wearing a Quaker"s hat. The fact is they have no real taste. They dare not compromise their judgments on so puzzling a question. If on my next publication they should praise me, and so lug in _Endymion_, I will address them in a manner they will not at all relish.
The cowardliness of the Edinburgh is more than the abuse of the Quarterly". Exactly what Keats had antic.i.p.ated now took place. Jeffrey"s natural taste in poetry was conservative, and favoured the correct, the cla.s.sical and traditional: but in this case, whether from genuine and personal opinion, or to please influential well-wishers of Keats on his own side in politics and criticism like Sir James Mackintosh, he on the appearance of the new volume took occasion to print, now when Keats was far past caring about it, an article on his work which was mainly in eulogy of _Endymion_: eulogy not unmixed with reasonable criticism, but in a strain, on the whole, gushing almost to excess:--
We had never happened to see either of these volumes till very lately--and have been exceedingly struck with the genius they display, and the spirit of poetry which breathes through all their extravagance. That imitation of our older writers, and especially of our older dramatists, to which we cannot help flattering ourselves that we have somewhat contributed, has brought on, as it were, a second spring in our poetry;--and few of its blossoms are either more profuse of sweetness or richer in promise than this which is now before us. Mr Keats, we understand, is still a very young man; and his whole works, indeed, bear evidence enough of the fact. They are full of extravagance and irregularity, rash attempts at originality, interminable wanderings, and excessive obscurity. They manifestly require, therefore, all the indulgence that can be claimed for a first attempt: but we think it no less plain that they deserve it; for they are flushed all over with the rich lights of fancy, and so coloured and bestrewn with the flowers of poetry, that even while perplexed and bewildered in their labyrinths, it is impossible to resist the intoxication of their sweetness, or to shut our hearts to the enchantments they so lavishly present. The models upon which he has formed himself, in the _Endymion_, the earliest and by much the most considerable of his poems, are obviously the _Faithful Shepherdess_ of Fletcher, and the _Sad Shepherd_ of Ben Jonson;--the exquisite metres and inspired diction of which he has copied, with great boldness and fidelity--and, like his great originals, has also contrived to impart to the whole piece that true rural and poetical air which breathes only in them and in Theocritus--which is at once homely and majestic, luxurious and rude, and sets before us the genuine sights and sounds and smells of the country, with all the magic and grace of Elysium.
Then, after acknowledgment of the confusedness of the narrative and the fantastic wilfulness of some of the incidents and style, the critic goes on:--
There is no work, accordingly, from which a malicious critic could cull more matter for ridicule, or select more obscure, unnatural, or absurd pa.s.sages. But we do not take _that_ to be our office:--and just beg leave, on the contrary, to say, that any one who, on this account, would represent the whole poem as despicable, must either have no notion of poetry, or no regard to truth. It is, in truth, at least is full of genius as of absurdity; and he who does not find a great deal in it to admire and to give delight, cannot in his heart see much beauty in the two exquisite dramas to which we have already alluded, or find any great pleasure in some of the finest creations of Milton and Shakespeare. There are many such persons, we verily believe, even among the reading and judicious part of the community--correct scholars we have no doubt many of them, and, it may be, very cla.s.sical composers in prose and in verse--but utterly ignorant of the true genius of English poetry, and incapable of estimating its appropriate and most exquisite beauties. With that spirit we have no hesitation in saying that Mr K. is deeply imbued--and of those beauties he has presented us with many striking examples. We are very much inclined indeed to add, that we do not know any book which we would sooner employ as a test to ascertain whether anyone had in him a native relish for poetry, and a genuine sensibility to its intrinsic charm.
One immediate result of the Edinburgh criticism was to provoke an almost incredible outburst of jealous fury on the part of the personage then most conspicuous on the stage of England"s, nay of the world"s, poetry, Lord Byron. Byron, with next to no real critical power, could bring dazzling resources of wit and rhetoric to the support of any random opinion, traditional or revolutionary, he might happen by whim or habit to entertain. In these days he was just entering the lists as a self-appointed champion of Pope, the artificial school, and eighteenth century critical tradition in general, against Pope"s latest editor and depreciator, the clerical sonneteer William Lisle Bowles. Ever since the Pope-Boileau pa.s.sage in Keats"s _Sleep and Poetry_ it had been Byron"s pleasure to regard Keats with gratuitous contempt and aversion. When Murray sent him the _Lamia_ volume with a parcel of other books to Ravenna, he wrote back, "Pray send me _no more_ poetry but what is rare and decidedly good. There is such a trash of Keats and the like upon my tables that I am ashamed to look at them.... No more Keats, I entreat;--flay him alive; if some of you don"t I must skin him myself; there is no bearing the drivelling idiotism of the Mankin." A month later, evidently not having read a word of Keats"s book, he comes across Jeffrey"s praise of it in the _Edinburgh Review_, and thereupon falls into a fit of anger so foul-mouthed and outrageous that his latest, far from squeamish editors have had to mask its grossness under a cloud of asterisks. A little later he repeats the same disgusting obscenities in cool blood: his only quotable remark on the subject being as follows:--"Of the praises of that little dirty blackguard Keates in the Edinburgh, I shall observe as Johnson did when Sheridan the actor got a _pension_: "What, has he got a pension? Then it is time I should give up _mine_." n.o.body could be prouder of the praises of the Edinburgh than I was, or more alive to their censure. At present all the men they have ever praised are degraded by that insane article." By and by he proceeded to administer his own castigation to "Mr John Ketch" in a second letter written for the Pope-Bowles controversy: but Keats having died meanwhile he withheld this from publication, and a little later, perhaps at the prompting of his own better mind, but more probably through the good influence of Sh.e.l.ley, took in _Don Juan_ the altered tone about Keats which all the world knows, and having been at first thus savagely bent on hunting with the hounds, turned and chose to run part of the way, as far as suited him, with the hare.
Sh.e.l.ley, of course, judged for himself; was incapable of a thought towards a brother poet that was not generous; and had moreover a feeling of true and particular kindness towards Keats. We have seen how wisely and fairly he judged _Endymion_. Were we to take merely his own words written at the time, we might think that he failed to do justice to the new volume as a whole. His first impression of it, coupled with a wildly overdrawn picture which had reached him of Keats"s sufferings under the stings of the reviewers, apparently determined him to sit down and draft that indignant letter to Gifford, never completed or delivered, pleading against the repet.i.tion of any such treatment of his new volume as _Endymion_ had received from the _Quarterly_. In this Sh.e.l.ley speaks of _Hyperion_ as though it were the one thing he admired in the book: and writing about the same time to Peac.o.c.k, he says "Among modern things which have reached me is a volume of poems by Keats; in other respects insignificant enough, but containing the fragment of a poem called _Hyperion_. I dare say you have not time to read it; but it certainly is an astonishing piece of writing, and gives me a conception of Keats which I confess I had not before." And again, "Among your anathemas of modern poetry, do you include Keats"s _Hyperion_? I think it very fine.
His other poems are worth little; but if the _Hyperion_ be not grand poetry, none has been produced by our contemporaries." In considering these utterances we should remember that they were addressed to correspondents bound to be unsympathetic. Gifford would be so as a matter of course: while Peac.o.c.k had from old Marlow days been a disbeliever in Keats and his poetry, and had lately adopted a public att.i.tude of disbelief in modern poetry altogether. We must also remember that Sh.e.l.ley had himself been wrought into a mood of unwonted intolerance of certain fashions in poetry by some of Barry Cornwall"s recent performances, which he held to be an out-Hunting of Hunt and out-Byroning of Byron.[8] There is a statement of Medwin"s which, if Medwin were ever a witness much to be trusted, we would rather take as representing Sh.e.l.ley"s ripened and permanent opinion of the contents of the _Lamia_ volume than his own words to Gifford or Peac.o.c.k. "He perceived", says Medwin, "in every one of these productions a marked and continually progressing improvement, and hailed with delight his release from his leading strings, his emanc.i.p.ation from what he called a "perverse and limited school". _The Pot of Basil_ and _The Eve of St Agnes_ he read and re-read with ever new delight, and looked upon _Hyperion_ as almost faultless, grieving that it was but a fragment and that Keats had not been encouraged to complete a work worthy of Milton."
At all events Sh.e.l.ley, apart from the immortal tribute of _Adonais_, has left other words of his own which may content us, addressed to a different correspondent, as to what he felt about Keats and his work and promise on the whole, without reference to one poem rather than another.
I mean those in which he expresses to Mrs Leigh Hunt his hope to see and take care of Keats in Italy:--"I consider his a most valuable life, and I am deeply interested in his safety. I intend to be the physician both of his body and of his soul, to keep the one warm, and to teach the other Greek and Spanish. I am aware, indeed, in part, that I am nourishing a rival who will far surpa.s.s me; and this is an additional motive, and will be an added pleasure."
The opinions of neither of these two famous men, Byron and Sh.e.l.ley, will have had any immediate effect in England. Murray could not possibly disseminate Byron"s private obscenities, and Byron"s own intended public castigation of Keats in a second letter to Bowles was, as we have seen, withheld. On the other side Sh.e.l.ley made no public use of the draft of his indignant letter to Gifford, and Peac.o.c.k would not be by way of saying much about his private expressions of enthusiasm for _Hyperion_.
But we can gather the impression current in sympathetic circles about Keats"s future from a couple of entries in the December diaries of Crabb Robinson. He tells how he has been reading out some of the new volume, first _Hyperion_ and then _The Pot of Basil_, to his friends the Aders", and adds,--"There is a force, wildness, and originality in the works of this young poet which, if his perilous journey to Italy does not destroy him, promise to place him at the head of our next generation of poets.
Lamb places him next to Wordsworth--not meaning any comparison, for they are dissimilar" ... and again, "I am greatly mistaken if Keats do not soon take a high place among our poets. Great feeling and a powerful imagination are shown in this little volume." Had his health held out, such recognition would have been all and more than all Keats asked for or would have thought he had yet earned. But praise and dispraise were all one to him before now, and we must go back and follow the tragedy of his personal history to its close.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] A letter of Procter"s to Keats shows that he had been among Keats"s visitors during the weeks that followed his attack of haemorrhage (see Buxton Forman, _Complete Works_, v. 163). Whether they had been much or at all acquainted before then seems uncertain, but Procter"s impressions of Keats recorded almost half a century later read as though he had known him while still in health:--
"I saw him only two or three times before his departure for Italy.
I was introduced to him by Leigh Hunt, and found him very pleasant, and free from all affectation in manner and opinion.
Indeed, it would be difficult to discover a man with a more bright and open countenance. He was always ready to hear and to reply; to discuss, to reason, to admit; and to join in serious talk or common gossip. It has been said that his poetry was affected and effeminate. I can only say that I never encountered a more manly and simple young man. In person he was short, and had eyes large and wonderfully luminous, and a resolute bearing; not defiant, but well sustained."
[2] As against this judgment, formed from photographs of the wrecked picture and from the general character of Haydon"s work, let it be remembered that Hazlitt, no mean judge, declares that the head of Wordsworth is of all his portraits "the most like his drooping weight of thought and expression." Lamb"s complimentary punning address, _In tabulam eximii pictoris_, with its English translation, may be taken as exercises in friendly congratulation rather than in criticism. The picture in its present state is reproduced and discussed by Mr Louis A. Holman in the New York _Bookman_, Feb. 1913, pp. 608 _sqq._
[3] Medwin"s carelessness of statement and workmanship are well known: he is perfectly casual in the use of quotation marks and the like, and in the original edition of his untrustworthy _Life of Sh.e.l.ley_ it was difficult to be sure that these words were quoted as textually Mrs Lindon"s own. But in re-editing the book from its author"s revised and expanded copy, Mr Buxton Forman has left no doubt on the matter.
[4] I allude to the various editions issued in recent years by the Delegates of the Oxford University Press, to whom I would hereby appeal to let the piece be cancelled on the plates and the earlier text re-established.
[5] The recognition of this review and its inclusion in the canon of Lamb"s works is one of the many services for which thanks are due to his never-enough-to-be-praised editor, Mr E. V. Lucas (_The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb_, Vol. I, pp. 200, 470).
[6] Clare is John Clare, the distressed peasant poet, in whom many kindly people fancied they had discovered an English Burns, and on whose behalf, at the same time as on Keats"s, Taylor was exerting himself to raise a fund. "Peter Corcoran" refers to a brilliant medley called _The Fancy_ lately published anonymously by John Hamilton Reynolds, and purporting to tell the fortunes and sample the poetical remains of an ill-starred youth so-named, lured away from fair prospects in love and literature by a pa.s.sion for the prize ring. The gaps and queries in this letter, the MS. of which is in America, indicate places which its friendly transcriber found illegible.
[7] Morgan MSS. Some words at the end have baffled the transcriber.
[8] _Letters of Percy Bysshe Sh.e.l.ley_, ed. Ingpen, vol. ii, p. 839.
CHAPTER XVI
AUGUST 1820-FEBRUARY 1821: VOYAGE TO ITALY: LAST DAYS AND DEATH AT ROME
Resolve to winter in Italy--Severn as companion--The "Maria Crowther"--Fellow pa.s.sengers--Storm in the Channel--Held up in the Solent--Landing near Lulworth--The "Bright Star" sonnets--The voyage resumed--A meditated poem--Incidents at sea--Quarantine at Naples--Letters from Keats and Haslam--Lady pa.s.sengers described--A cry of agony--Neapolitan impressions--On the road to Rome--Life at Rome--Apparent improvement--Relapse and despair--Severn"s ministrations--His letters from the sickroom--The same continued--Tranquil last days--Choice of epitaph--Spirit of charm and pleasantness--The end.
In telling of the critical reception of Keats"s _Lamia_ volume I have antic.i.p.ated by three or four months the course of time. Returning to his personal condition and doings, we find that by or before the date of his move from Kentish Town to be under the care of the Brawne ladies at Wentworth Place, that is by mid-August, he had accepted the verdict of the doctors that a winter in Italy would be the only thing to give him a chance of recovery. He determined accordingly, not without sore gain-giving and agitation of mind, to make the attempt. In his letter to Sh.e.l.ley acknowledging receipt of _The Cenci_ and answering Sh.e.l.ley"s invitation to Pisa, he writes:--"there is no doubt that an English winter would put an end to me, and do so in a lingering, hateful, manner. Therefore, I must either voyage or journey to Italy, as a soldier marches up to a battery". And again, using the same phrase, he writes to Taylor on August 14th:--"This journey to Italy wakes me at daylight every morning, and haunts me horribly. I shall endeavour to go, though it will be with the sensation of marching against a battery.
The first step towards it is to know the expense of a journey and a year"s residence, which if you will ascertain for me, and let me know early, you will greatly serve me." The next day he sends Taylor a note of his wish that in case of his death his books should be divided among his friends and that any a.s.sets arising or to arise from the sale of his poems should be devoted to paying his debts--those to Brown and to Taylor himself ranking first. The good publisher promptly bestirred himself to enquire about sailings and make provision for ways and means.
For the latter purpose he bought the copyright of _Endymion_ for 100, furnished Keats at starting with a bill on London for 120, and procured promises of eventual help to the extent of 100 more by subscription among persons interested in the poet"s fate; James Rice and the painters Hilton and De Wint being among guarantors of 10 each and Lord Fitzwilliam closing the list with a promise of 50.
The vessel chosen for the voyage was a merchant brigantine, the "Maria Crowther," having berth accommodation for a few pa.s.sengers and due to sail from London about the middle of September. The four intervening weeks were spent by the invalid in comparative respite from suffering and distress under the eye and tendance of his beloved. By his desire Haydon came one day to see him, and has told, with a painter"s touch, how he found him "lying in a white bed, with white quilt, and white sheets, the only colour visible was the hectic flush of his cheeks."
Haydon"s vehement, self-confident and self-righteous manner of admonition to friends in trouble seems to have had an effect the reverse of consolatory, and elsewhere he amplifies this account of his last sight of Keats, saying, "He seemed to be going out of life with a contempt for this world and no hopes of the other. I told him to be calm, but he muttered that if he did not soon get better he would destroy himself. I tried to reason against such violence, but it was no use; he grew angry, and I went away deeply affected." Writing about the same time to his young sister, Keats shows himself, as ever, thoughtful and wise on her behalf and does his best to be re-a.s.suring on his own:--
Now you are better, keep so. Do not suffer your Mind to dwell on unpleasant reflexions--that sort of thing has been the destruction of my health. Nothing is so bad as want of health--it makes one envy scavengers and cinder sifters. There are enough real distresses and evils in wait for every one to try the most vigorous health. Not that I would say yours are not real--but they are such as to tempt you to employ your imagination on them, rather than endeavour to dismiss them entirely. Do not diet your mind with grief, it destroys the const.i.tution; but let your chief care be of your health, and with that you will meet your share of Pleasure in the world--do not doubt it. If I return well from Italy I will turn over a new leaf for you. I have been improving lately, and have very good hopes of "turning a Neuk"
and cheating the consumption.
For a companion on his journey, Keats"s first thoughts turned to Brown, who was still away on his second tramp through the Highlands. But the letter he wrote asking whether Brown could go with him missed its destination, and he was left with the prospect of having either to give up his journey or venture on it alone, a thing hardly to be thought of in his state of health. At this juncture Haslam, always the most useful of friends in an emergency, betook himself to Severn, whose prospects in London, in spite of the practice he had found as a miniature-painter and of his success in winning the gold medal of the Academy the previous December, seemed far from bright, and urged him to go out with Keats to Rome. Severn at once consented, his immediate impulse of devotion to his friend being strengthened, on reflection, both by the lure of Rome itself and by the idea that he might be able while there to work for, and perhaps win, the travelling studentship of the Royal Academy. He made his arrangements on the shortest possible notice, while Haslam undertook the business of procuring pa.s.sports and the like. A weird incident marked Severn"s departure from his home. His father, pa.s.sionately attached to him but resenting his resolve to go to Italy now as fiercely as he had before resented his change of profession, on being asked to lend a hand in moving his trunk, in an uncontrollable fit of anger struck and felled him. How and with what rending of the heart Keats took his own farewell from the home of his joy and torment at Hampstead--of this we hear, and may be thankful to hear, nothing. He spent his last days in England with Taylor in Fleet Street, having gone thither on Wednesday September 13th to be at hand for the day and hour when the "Maria Crowther" might be ready to sail. On the evening of Sunday the 17th of September he and Severn went on board at the London docks. Here the kind Taylor and the serviceable Haslam took leave of them, and their ship weighed anchor and slipped down tide as far as Gravesend, where she came to moorings for the night. Moored close by her was a smack from Dundee, and on board this smack, by one of the minor perversities of fate, who should be a pa.s.senger but Charles Brown? He had caught this means of conveyance as the first available when he at last got news of Keats"s plans, and had hoped to reach London in time to bid him farewell. But it was all unknowingly that the friends lay that night within earshot of one another.
One lady pa.s.senger, a Miss Pidgeon, had come aboard at the docks: a pleasing person, the friends thought at first, but found reason to change their minds later. At Gravesend early the next morning there came another, a pretty and gentle Miss Cotterell, as far gone in consumption as Keats himself. Keats was in lively spirits and exerted himself with Severn to welcome and amuse the new comer. In the course of the day Severn went ash.o.r.e to buy medicines and other needments for the voyage, and among them, at Keats"s special request, a bottle of laudanum. The captain, by name Thomas Walsh, was kind and attentive and did his best, unsuccessfully, to find a goat for the supply of goat"s milk to the invalids while on board ship. That evening they put to sea, and Keats"s health and spirits seemed to rise with the first excitements of the voyage. The events of the next days are best told in the words of the journal-letter written at the time by Severn to Haslam; vagueness of memory having made much less trustworthy the several accounts of the voyage which he wrote and rewrote in after years. Severn was innocent of all stops save dashes, and I print exactly as he wrote:--
19th Sept. Tuesday, off Dover Castle, etc.
I arose at day break to see the glorious eastern gate--Keats slept till 7--Miss C. was rather ill this morning I prevailed on her to walk the deck with me at half past 6 she recovered much--Keats was still better this morning and Mrs Pidgeon looked and was the picture of health--but poor me! I began to feel a waltzing on my stomach at breakfast when I wrote the note to you I was going it most soundly--Miss Cotterell followed me--then Keats who did it in the most gentlemanly manner--and then the saucy Mrs Pidgeon who had been laughing at us--four faces bequeathing to the mighty deep their breakfasts--here I must change to a minor key Miss C. fainted--we soon recovered her--I was very ill nothing but lying down would do for me.
Keats ascended his bed--from which he dictated surgically like Esculapius of old in ba.s.so-relievo through him Miss C. was recovered we had a cup of tea each and no more went to bed and slept until it was time to go to bed--we could not get up again--and slept in our clothes all night--Keats the King--not even looking pale.
20th Sept. Wednesday off Brighton. Beautiful morning--we all breakfasted on deck and recovered as we were could enjoy it--about 10 Keats said a storm was hatching--he was right--the rain came on and we retired to our cabin--it abated and once more we came on deck--at 2 storm came on furiously--we retired to our beds. The rolling of the ship was death to us--towards 4 it increased and our situation was alarming--the trunks rolled across the cabin--the water poured in from the sky-light and we were tumbled from one side to the other of our beds--my curiosity was raised to see the storm--and my anxiety to see Keats for I could only speak to him when in bed--I got up and fell down on the floor from my weakness and the rolling of the ship. Keats was very calm--the ladies were much frightened and would scarce speak--when I got up to the deck I was astounded--the waves were in mountains and washed the ship--the watery horizon was like a mountainous country--but the ship"s motion was beautifully to the sea falling from one wave to the other in a very lovely manner--the sea each time crossing the deck and one side of the ship being level with the water--this when I understood gave me perfect ease--I communicated below and it did the same--but when the dusk came the sea began to rush in from the side of our cabin from an opening in the planks--this made us rather long faced--for it came by pail-fulls--again I got out and said to Keats "here"s pretty music for you"--with the greatest calmness he answered me only by "Water parted from the sea."[1] I staggered up again and the storm was awful--the Captain and Mate soon came down--for our things were squashing about in the dark--they struck a light and I succeeded in getting my desk off the ground--with clothes and books, etc. The Captain finding it could not be stopped--tacked about from our voyage--and the sea ceased to dash against the cabin for we were sailing against wind and tide--but the horrible agitation continued in the ship lengthways--here were the pumps working--the sails squalling the confused voices of the sailors--the things rattling about in every direction and us poor devils pinn"d up in our beds like ghosts by daylight--except Keats he was himself all the time--the ladies suffered the most--but I was out of bed a dozen times to wait on them and tell them there was no danger--my sickness made me get into bed very soon each time--but Keats this morning brags of my sailorship--he says could I have kept on my legs in the water cabin I should have been a standing miracle.
20th Sept.