4.

Has any here a Lawyer suit

Of 1743,

Take Lawyer's nose and put it to't

And you the end will see.

5.

Is there a Man in Parliament

Dum[b-]founder'd in his speech,

O let his neighbour make a rent
And put one in his breech.

6.

O Lowther how much better thou

Hadst figur'd t'other day

When to the folks thou mad'st a bow
And hadst no more to say

7.

If lucky Gadfly had but ta'en

His seat

And put thee to a little pain

To save thee from a worse.

Letters). This ballad, now I believe first published, seems to me one of the brightest and most humourous of the pieces which Keats classified as doggerel; and I presume it may be assigned to the 17th of July 1818.

(4) Line 2 is of course to be read "Of seventeen forty three", not "Of seventeen hundred and forty three."

(6-8) I have not met with any account of the particular circumstance in which one of the members for Westmoreland figured in the manner described in stanza 6; but probably the contemporary newspaper press might show what episode Keats was contemplating

8.

Better than Southey it had been,

Better than Mr. D—,

Better than Wordsworth too, I ween,

Better than Mr. V—————.

9.

Forgive me pray good people all

For deviating so

In spirit sure I had a call

And now I on will go.

IO.

Has any here a daughter fair
Too fond of reading novels,
Too apt too fall in love with care
And charming Mister Lovels,

II.

O put a Gadfly to that thing
She keeps so white and pert-
I mean the finger for the ring,
And it will breed a wort.

in the memorable campaign in which the whigs tried to upset the then time-honoured influence of the House of Lowther, which had nominated the two county members, undisputedly, for a long time. The particular Lowther of stanza 6 was probably the Treasury Lord who was afterwards second Earl of Lonsdale. Wordsworth's Two Addresses to the Freeholders of Westmorland are probably glanced at in stanza 8; "Mr. V-" would doubtless be the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, Nicholas Vansittart; and "Mr. D-" may perhaps have been Mr. Dundas, who had held office in a previous ministry; but this last name rests upon mere conjecture.

(10) The reference is probably to the hero of Scott's novel The

12.

Has any here a pious spouse

Who seven times a day

Scolds as King David pray'd, to chouse
And have her holy way—

13.

O let a Gadfly's little sting
Persuade her sacred tongue
That noises are a common thing,
But that her bell has rung.

14.

And as this is the summum bo-
num of all conquering,

I leave "withouten wordes mo"
The Gadfly's little sting.

Antiquary, properly the Honourable William Geraldin, heir to the Earl of Glenallan, but known throughout the book as Mr. Lovel. (12) Perhaps the reference is to Psalm cix, verse 164, Seven times a day do I praise thee because of thy righteous judgments"; but there is certainly no intentional disrespect to David, the word chouse being the exclusive property of the pious scold.

SONNET.

On hearing the Bag-pipe and seeing "The Stranger" played at Inverary.

Of late two dainties were before me plac'd
Sweet, holy, pure, sacred and innocent,
From the ninth sphere to me benignly sent
That Gods might know my own particular taste:
First the soft Bag-pipe mourn'd with zealous haste,
The Stranger next with head on bosom bent
Sigh'd; rueful again the piteous Bag-pipe went,
Again the Stranger sighings fresh did waste.

It would seem to have been still the 17th of July when Keats and Brown "came round the end of Loch Fyne to Inverary ", as the poet tells his brother Tom in continuing the letter begun at Cairndow; for he makes a fresh start with "last evening," and lower down another fresh start dated July 20th in which he speaks of the lapse of two days. The letter to Bailey already mentioned is also dated "Inverary, July 18"; and that was doubtless the day on which he recounted to Tom the arrival at Inverary. Keats had been excruciated by a solo on the bag-pipe on the way," I thought," he says, "the brute would never have done-yet was I doomed to hear another. On entering Inverary we saw a Play Bill-Brown was knock'd up from new shoes-so I went to the Barn alone where I saw the Stranger accompanied by a Bag-pipe. There they went on about 'interesting creaters' and 'human nater'-till the curtain fell and then came the Bag-pipe. When Mrs. Haller fainted down went the curtain and out came the Bag-pipe-at the heartrending, shoemending reconciliation the Piper blew amain. I never read or saw this play before; not the Bag-pipe nor the wretched players

O Bag-pipe thou didst steal my heart away

O Stranger thou my nerves from Pipe didst charmO Bag-pipe thou didst re-assert thy sway—

Again thou Stranger gav'st me fresh alarm— Alas! I could not choose. Ah! my poor heart Mum chance art thou with both oblig'd to part.

themselves were little in comparison with it-thank heaven it has been scoffed at lately almost to a fashion". The sonnet given above follows this passage without a break; and I presume we may safely assign it to the 18th of July 1818. It has already been published, in The Athenæum of the 7th of June 1873. Without being in any sense a good sonnet, it is highly interesting as the record of a mood, and of Keats's attitude towards the wretched but once renowned work of August von Kotzebue, translated into English and performed at Drury Lane as long ago as 1798. The part of Mrs. Haller has been graced by no less a player than Mrs. Siddons. The manuscript of the sonnet shows a cancelled reading in line 8, sighed in discontent, rejected of course as upsetting the metre.