The Nineteenth Century , No 182, Apr 1892 [‎51r] (106/244)

1892 THE STORY OFGIFFORD^ AND 591
Endymion. About half-a-dozen quotations are made from this
volume, with interspersed banter of the young poet under the familiar
name of ' Mr. John' or ' Johnny,' and ironical comments on his
connection with Leigh Hunt and the rest of the Cockney set, but with
no definite criticism beyond what may be implied in such phrases as
4 this gossamer work,'' the following prurient and vulgar lines,' and the
italicising for the eye of one or two of those Cockney rhymes with
which Keats sometimes marred his verse. 5 So much for the opening
bud; now for the expanded flower,' says the Keviewer, then leaving
the early volume, and passing to the Here also he is
severe, without showing very distinctly why. The chief theme is
still the young poet's connection with the abominable Leigh Hunt.
From Ms prototype Hunt [we are told] John Keats lias acquired a sort of vague
idea that the Greeks were a most tasteful people, and that no mythology can be
so finely adapted for the purposes of poetry as theirs. It is amusing to see what
a hand the two Cockneys make of this mythology : the one confesses that he never
read the Greek tragedians, and the other knows Homer only from Chapman; and
both of them write about Apollo, Pan, Nymphs, Muses, and Mysteries, as might be
expected from persons of their education.
The conception of Endymion is declared to be utterly un-
Grecian.
No man [it is said] whose mind has ever been imbued with the smallest know
ledge or feeling of classical poetry or classical history could have stooped to pro
fane and vulgarise every association in the manner which has been adopted by this
' son of promise.'
The execution is pronounced no better than the conception.
Mr. Keats [says the Reviewer] has adopted the loose, nerveless versification
and Cockney rhymes of the poet of Rimini ; but, in fairness to that gentleman, we
must add that the defects of the system are tenfold more conspicuous in his
disciple's work than in his own. Mr. Hunt is a small poet, but he is a clever man.
Mr. Keats is a still smaller poet, and he is only a boy of pretty abilities, which he
has done everything in his power to spoil.
Some specimen quotations are then given, with intimation that
they must suffice, and that the Eeviewer has ' no patience for going
over four books filled with such amorous scenes as these, with subter
raneous journeys equally amusing, and submarine processions equally
beautiful.'
But the climax of contempt is reached in the last paragraph;
where the Eeviewer takes farewell of his victim with these cutting
words:—
"We venture to make one small prophecy—that his bookseller will not a second
time venture 50Z. on anything he can write. It is a better and a wiser thing to
be a starved apothecary than a starved poet: so back to the shop, Mr. John, back
to the plasters, pills, and ointment-boxes, &c. But, for Heaven's sake, young
Sangrado, be a little more sparing of extenuatives and soporifics in your prac
tice than you have been in your poetry.
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