Poetry" began in the Scotch magazine in October 1817, being directed mainly, and with calumnious virulence, against Leigh Hunt. No. 4 of the series came. out in August 1818, and formed a vituperation of Keats. I will not draw upon its stores of underbred jocularity, so as to show that the best raillery which Blackwood could get up consisted of terming him Johnny Keats, and referring to his having been assistant to an "apothecary." The author of these papers signed himself Z, being no doubt too noble and courageous to traduce people without muffling himself in anonymity; nor did he consent to uncloak, though vigorously pressed by Hunt to do so. It is affirmed that Z was Lockhart, the son-in-law of Sir Walter Scott, and afterwards editor of The Quarterly Review; and an unpleasant adjunct to this statement-we would gladly disbelieve it is that Scott himself lent active aid in concocting the articles. A different account is that Z was at first John Wilson (Christopher North), revised by William Blackwood, but that the article on Keats was due to Lockhart.

Few literary questions of the last three-quarters of a century have been regarded from more absolutely different points of view than the problem-How did Keats receive the attacks made upon his poem and himself? From an early date in the controversy three points seem to have been very generally agreed upon : (1) That "Endymion" is (as Shelley judiciously phrased it), “a poem considerably defective;" (2) that the attacks upon were, in essence, partly true, but so biassed—so keen of scent after defects, and so dull of vision for beauties--as

it

to be practically unfair and perverse in a marked degree; and (3) that the unfairness and perversity quoad Keats were wilful devices of literary and especially of political spite quoad a knot of writers among whom Leigh Hunt was the central figure. The question remains-In what spirit did Keats meet his critics? Was he greatly distressed, or defiant and retaliatory, or substantially indifferent?

Among the documents of Keats's life I find few records strictly contemporary with the events themselves, serving to settle this point. When the abuse of Z against Hunt began, Keats was indignant and combative. He said in a letter which may belong to October 1817—

"There has been a flaming attack upon Hunt in the Edinburgh magazine. . . . There has been but one number published—that on Hunt, to which they have prefixed a motto by one Cornelius Webb, 'Poetaster,' who unfortunately was one of our party occasionally at Hampstead, and took it into his head to write the follow. ing (something about)

'We'll talk on Wordsworth, Byron,

A theme we never tire on,'

and so forth till he came to Hunt and Keats. In the motto they have put 'Hunt and Keats' in large letters. I have no doubt that the second number was intended for me, but have hopes of its non-appearance. . . . I don't mind the thing much; but, if he should go to such lengths with me as he has done with Hunt, I must infallibly call him to an account, if he be a human being,

and appears in squares and theatres where we might 'possibly meet.' I don't relish his abuse."

It is worth observing also that, in a paper "On Kean as Richard Duke of York" which Keats published on December 28, 1817, he wrote: "The English people do not care one fig about Shakespeare, only as he flatters their pride and their prejudices; . . . it is our firm opinion." If he thought that English indifference to Shakespeare was of this degree of density, he must surely have been prepared for a considerable amount of apathy in relation to any poem by John Keats.

On October 9, 1818, just after the spiteful notices of himself in Blackwood and The Quarterly had appeared, and had been replied to in The Morning Chronicle by two correspondents signing J. S. and R. B., Keats wrote as follows to his publisher Mr. Hessey; and to treat the affair in a more self-possessed, measured, and dignified spirit, would not have been possible :

"You are very good in sending me the letters from The Chronicle, and I am very bad in not acknowledging such a kindness sooner; pray forgive me. It has so chanced that I have had that paper every day. I have seen to-day's. I cannot but feel indebted to those gentlemen who have taken my part. As for the rest, I begin to get a little acquainted with my own strength and weakPraise or blame has but a momentary effect on the man whose love of beauty in the abstract makes him a severe critic on his own works. My own domestic criticism has given me pain without comparison beyond what Blackwood or The Quarterly could possibly inflict;

ness.

and also, when I feel I am right, no external praise can give me such a glow as my own solitary reperception and ratification of what is fine. J. S. is perfectly right in regard to the 'slipshod "Endymion." That it is so is ' 1 no fault of mine. No; though it may sound a little paradoxical, it is as good as I had power to make it by myself. Had I been nervous about its being a perfect piece, and with that view asked advice, and trembled over every page, it would not have been written, for it is not in my nature to fumble. I will write independently. I have written independently, without judgment: I may write independently, and with judgment, hereafter. The genius of poetry must work out its own salvation in a man. It cannot be matured by law and precept, but by sensation and watchfulness in itself. That which is creative must create itself. In 'Endymion' I leaped headlong into the sea, and thereby have become better acquainted with the soundings, the quicksands, and the rocks, than if I had stayed upon the green shore and piped a silly pipe, and took tea and comfortable advice. I was never afraid of failure, for I would sooner fail than not be among the greatest. But I am nigh getting into a rant; so, with remembrances to Taylor and Woodhouse, &c., I am yours very sincerely,

"JOHN KEATS."

This letter, equally moderate and wide-reaching, proves conclusively that Keats, at the time when he wrote it, treated depreciatory criticism in exactly the right spirit;

This phrase stands printed with inverted commas, as a quotation. It is not, however, a quotation from the letter of J. S.

acknowledging that it was not without a certain raison d'être, but affirming that he could for himself see much further and much deeper in the same direction, and in others as well. On October 29, 1818, he wrote to his brother George :

"Reynolds persuades me to publish my 'Pot of Basil' as an answer to the attack made on me in Blackwood's Magazine and The Quarterly Review. . . . I think I shall be among the English poets after my death. Even as a matter of present interest, the attempt to crush me in The Quarterly has only brought me more into notice, and it is a common expression among book-men, 'I wonder The Quarterly should cut its own throat.' It does me not the least harm in society to make me appear little and ridiculous. I know when a man is superior to me, and give him all due respect; he will be the last to laugh at me; and as for the rest, I feel that I make an impression upon them which ensures me personal respect while I am in sight, whatever they may say when my back is turned. . . . The only thing that can ever affect me personally for more than one short passing day is any doubt about my powers for poetry. I seldom have any; and I look with hope to the nighing time when I shall have none."

Towards December 1818 he wrote in a similarly contented strain to George Keats and his wife: "You will be glad to hear that Gifford's attack upon me has done me service; it has got my book among several sets." The same letter mentions a sonnet, and a bank-note for £25