8.
Forlorn! the very word is like a bell

To toll me back from thee to my sole self !
Adieu ! the fancy cannot cheat so well

As she is fam'd to do, deceiving elf.
Adieu! adieu ! thy plaintive anthem fades
Past the near meadows, over the still stream,
Up the hill-side; and now 'tis buried deep

In the next valley-glades :
Was it a vision, or a waking dream?

Fled is that music :-Do I wake or sleep?

imagination safely back to the middle ages—to Amadis of Gaul, to Palmerin of England, and above all to the East, to the Thousand and One Nights. It seems to me unlikely that any particular story is referred to, though there are doubtless many stories that will answer more or less nearly to the passage.

(8) In the manuscript and in the Annals, there is a note of exclamation after elf in the fourth line. In the manuscript the last two lines are pointed thus :

Was it a vision? or a waking dream ?

Fled is that music? do I wake or sleep.
In the Annals they stand thus :

Was it a vision ? Or a waking dream ?
Fled is that music? Do I wake or sleep?

ODE ON A GRECIAN URN.

I.

THOU still unravish'd bride of quietness,

Thou foster-child of silence and slow time,
Sylvan historian, who canst thus express

A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme:
What leaf-fring'd legend haunts about thy shape

This Ode is mentioned by Lord Houghton in connexion with the Ode to a Nightingale as belonging to the Spring of 1819; and we are informed of both alike that, soon after they were composed, Keats“ repeated, or rather chanted, them to Mr. Haydon, in the sort of recitative that so well suited his deep grave voice, as they strolled together through Kilburn meadows, leaving an indelible impression on the mind of his surviving friend." The manuscript in Sir Charles Dilke's copy of Endymion is dated simply“ 1819". The poem appeared in Number XV of Annals of the Fine Arts, headed “On a Grecian Urn", and signed with a “dagger" (t). It would seem to have appeared in January 1820. There is some reason for thinking that the particular urn which inspired this beautiful poem is a somewhat weather-beaten work in marble still preserved in the garden of Holland House, and figured in Piranesi's Vasi e Candelabri.

(1) In the Annals, in line i of this stanza, there is a comma after still, which we do not find in the Lamia volume or in the manuscript. In line 8 in the Annals we read What Gods or Men are these? And both in the magazine and in the manuscript, the last line but one is

What love? what dance? what struggle to escape ? The version of the volume, given in the text, is an obvious revision. Of deities or mortals, or of both,

In Tempe or the dales of Arcady? What men or gods are these? What maidens loth ? What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape ?

What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?

2. Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard

Are sweeter; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on ;
Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear'd,

Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone :
Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave
Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;

Bold Lover, never, never canst thou kiss,
Though winning near the goal-yet, do not grieve;
She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,

For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!

3 Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed

Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring adieu ;
And, happy melodist, unwearied,

For ever piping songs for ever new;
More happy love! more happy, happy love!
For ever warm and still to be enjoy'd,

For ever panting, and for ever young;
All breathing human passion far above,
That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloy'd,

A burning forehead, and a parching tongue.

(2) Lines 5 and 6 of this stanza stand thus in the Annals :

Fair Youth, beneath the trees thou cans't not leave

Thy song, nor ever bid the spring adieu ; and in line 8 both the Annals and the manuscript read 0 do not grieve!

(3) In the Annals line 2 has never in place of ever.

4.
Who are these coming to the sacrifice ?

To what green altar, O mysterious priest,
Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies,

And all her silken flanks with garlands drest ?
What little town by river or sea shore,
Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel,

Is emptied of this folk, this pious morn?
And, little town, thy streets for evermore
Will silent be; and not a soul to tell

Why thou art desolate, can e'er return.

5.
O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede

Of marble men and maidens overwrought,
With forest branches and the trodden weed;

Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought
As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral !

When old age shall this generation waste,

(4) The manuscript, in line 4, reads sides in place of flanks; and in line 10 neer for e'er.

(5) In the manuscript there is a comma after maidens in line 2, and none after overwrought; but the preferable punctuation of the text is in both of the printed versions. In line 7 the manuscript and the Annals agree in reading wilt for shalt. In regard to the two final lines the version of the Lamia volume is adopted above. In the manuscript there are no turned commas; and in the Annals the two lines are thus :

Beauty is Truth, Truth Beauty.—That is all

Ye know on Earth, and all ye need to know. This seems to confirm the limitation of the Urn's moral to the five words indicated in the text; and, although I have not thought it worth while to note all the variations of pointing and capitalling of the Annals version, I find them very characteristic of Keats, and

Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say'st,

Beauty is truth, truth beauty,"—that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

suggestive of accurate printing from a fair manuscript of his. But for this I should have been disposed to regard the words

that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know as a part of the Urn's lesson, and not as the poet's personal comment.