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N September, 1820, Keats's health was so much broken that his physicians advised that he go to Italy, hoping that a gentler climate might lengthen his life. He accordingly started on his journey, accompanied by his faithful friend Joseph Severn, the painter. The journey was delayed by storms and a quarantine of ten days at Naples. His health, when he arrived in Naples, was in no way mended. At Naples he received a pressing invitation from Shelley to visit him at Pisa. The travelers pressed on to Rome, however, where Keats was taken in charge by Dr. (afterward Sir James) Clark, who was all kindness and attention to the sufferer. The last letter written by Keats was that to Mr. Brown, from Rome, and dated November 30, 1820. That letter gives some VOL. I.

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account of his health. In describing the last few days I can do no better than transcribe from Lord Houghton's book the extracts taken from the letters of Mr. Severn, who wrote, on the 14th of December:

"Dec. 14th.-I fear poor Keats is at his worst. A most unlooked-for relapse has confined him to his bed, with every chance against him. It has been so sudden upon what I thought convalescence, and without any seeming cause, that I cannot calculate on the next change. I dread it, for his suffering is so great, so continued, and his fortitude so completely gone, that any further change must make him delirious. This is the fifth day, and I see him get worse.

"Dec. 17th, 4 A. M.- Not a moment can I be from him. I sit by his bed and read all day, and at night I humour him in all his wanderings. He has just fallen asleep, the first sleep for eight nights, and now from mere exhaustion. I hope he will not wake till I have written, for I am anxious you should know the truth; yet I dare not let him see I think his state dangerous. On the morning of his attack he was going on in good spirits, quite merrily, when, in an instant, a cough seized him, and he vomited two cupfulls of blood. In a moment I got Dr. Clark, who took eight ounces of blood from his arm - it was black and thick. Keats was much alarmed and dejected. What a sorrowful day I had with him! He rushed out of bed and said, 'This day shall be my last'; and

but for me most certainly it would. The blood broke forth in similar quantity the next morning, and he was bled again. I was afterwards so fortunate as to talk him into a little calmness, and he soon became quite patient. Now the blood has come up in coughing, five times. Not a single thing will he digest, yet he keeps on craving for food. Every day he raves he will die from hunger, and I've been obliged to give him more than was allowed. His imagination and memory present every thought to him in horror; the recollection of 'his good friend Brown,' of 'his four happy weeks spent under her care,' of his sister and brother. O! he will mourn over all to me whilst I cool his burning forehead, till I tremble for his intellects. How can he be 'Keats' again after all this? Yet I may see it too gloomily, since each coming night I sit up adds its dismal contents to my mind.

"Dr. Clark will not say much; although there are no bounds to his attention, yet he can with little success'administer to a mind diseased.' All that can be done he does most kindly, while his lady, like himself in refined feeling, prepares all that poor Keats takes, for in this wilderness of a place, for an invalid, there was no alternative. Yesterday, Dr. Clark went all over Rome for a certain kind of fish, and just as I received it carefully dressed, Keats was taken with spitting of blood. We have the best opinion of Dr. Clark's skill: he comes over four or five times a day, and he has left word for us to call him up, at any moment, in case of danger. My spirits have been quite pulled down. These wretched Romans have no idea of comfort.

I am

obliged to do everything for him. I wish you were here.

"I have just looked at him. This will be a good night.

"Jan. 15th, 1821, half-past Eleven.- Poor Keats has just fallen asleep. I have watched him and read to him to his very last wink; he has been saying to me-Severn, I can see under your quiet look immense contention; you don't know what you are reading. You are enduring for me more than I would have you. O! that my last hour was come!' He is sinking daily; perhaps another three weeks may lose him to me for ever! I made sure of his recovery when we set out. I was selfish; I thought of his value to me; I made my own public success to depend on his candour to me.1

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The following letter indicates that Severn recognized that, for his sacrifices for his friend, he received at least some return:

MY DEAR MADAM:

Rome, where I am likely to remain all my life, and where I first came in his dear company in Nov., 1820, and on his account-altho' on my

ROME, Sept. 1st, 1863. part so mad a thing as it seemed at the time and was pronounced so by most of my friends; yet it was the best and perhaps the only step to insure my artistic career, which no doubt was watched and blessed by this dear spirit, for I remained twenty years without returning to England, and during that time the patrons I most valued came to me as "the friend of Keats." These have remained faithful to me and mine, no doubt inspired by the revered name Poet. The success of my family (three sons and

This is a line to assure you that I am the “one devoted friend until death" of your illustrious relative, John Keats, and that it has gratified me highly to be addressed by you in consequence of your reading my essay "On the vicissitudes of Keats's fame," as I had the happiness to meet his sister here (Madam d'Llanos) after forty-five years! I trust it may be also my happiness to meet some news of his family in