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 FROM A PENCIL DRAWING BY SEYMOUR K1RKUP 
 
 Sampson Low fit. C° Ltd 
 
 ROME 1822 
 HeIio6 . Lemercier Pari 
 
THE 
 
 LIFE AND LETTERS 
 
 OF 
 
 JOSEPH SEVERN 
 
 BY 
 
 WILLIAM SHARP 
 
 "'■ -M.LI 
 
 f 'I Uf.Y 
 
 T 
 
 Severn's recollection in old age of Keats 
 
 LONDON 
 SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON & COMPANY 
 
 LIMITED 
 
 Jbt. ffihtnuStan'jS HouSe 
 Fetter Lane, Fleet Street, E.C. 
 
 1892 
 
TO 
 
 WALTER SEVEEN and AETHUE SEVEEN 
 
 THE DISTINGUISHED SONS OF 
 
 A DISTINGUISHED FATHER: 
 
 INHERITORS OF A NAME IMMORTALLY ASSOCIATED WITH THAT OF 
 
 ONE OF THE GREATEST OF ENGLISH POETS, 
 
 THESE MEMOIRS ARE INSCRIBED. 
 
PEEFACE. 
 
 Several years have elapsed since the Severn MSS. con- 
 sisting of a great mass of letters, journals, reminiscences, 
 and fragmentary records, were placed in the hands of the 
 present writer to be edited at his discretion. One or two 
 editorial considerations, as well as other equally potent 
 causes beyond his control, necessitated delay after delay ; 
 but it will suffice to say now, that in the main the original 
 procrastination was due to the constantly recurring dis- 
 covery of much relative matter (chiefly correspondence) 
 which could not be overlooked, and also to the need, on 
 many points, of difficult inquiries and careful investigation. 
 The book was practically finished, in Rome, by the winter 
 of 1890-91, but since then it has been wholly re-written. 
 The original project was that the Memoirs should be issued 
 in two large volumes, the first of which would practically 
 justify the title 'Keats and his Circle,' while the second 
 would for the most part be occupied with Severn's middle 
 period in London (1840 to 1860), his consular life (1861 to 
 1870) in Eome, and his last years in that city (1871 to 
 1879). But ultimately it was decided that this biographical 
 scheme should be abandoned in favour of a more concise 
 record. Of course, there is loss of a kind. A mass of 
 correspondence of considerable interest has had to be . 
 wholly disregarded, and records and diaries covering many 
 years have had to be condensed into even fewer pages. On 
 the other hand there is the gain involved in the exclusion 
 of much that would, in all probability, interest only a few 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 specialists, and of a still larger quantity of what in a sense 
 may be called historical matter — either irrelative to the 
 story of Severn's life, or which is to be found elsewhere, set 
 forth with wider knowledge and greater skill. There can 
 be little question that the life of Joseph Severn is of 
 interest to the present generation not so much by virtue of 
 his achievements as a painter, his consular services at a 
 vital period when the re-birth of Italy was yearly, daily, 
 almost hourly in process before his eyes, or even by that 
 winsome personality to which such generous testimony has 
 been borne by Mr. Euskin ; but on account of his intimate 
 connection with the great English poet who, howsoever we 
 may differ as to the qualities and reach of his genius, is, of 
 all his kindred, the singer who is nearest to our hearts. 
 Severn himself, declares a friend in Rome who knew him 
 intimately, remarked, not long before his death : " With a 
 truth that was ever inapplicable to Keats, I may say that of 
 all I have done with brush or pen, as artist or man, scarce 
 anything will long outlast me, for writ in water indeed are 
 my best deeds as well as my worst failures ; yet through, 
 my beloved Keats I shall be remembered — in the hearts of 
 all who revere my beloved Keats there will be a corner of 
 loving memory for me." Truly, Joseph Severn is worthy 
 of remembrance for much beside his perfect friendship for 
 Keats ; yet his own foreknowledge is not to be gainsaid in 
 great degree, for, notable as he was, and noteworthy much 
 in his accomplishment and artistic and literary experiences, 
 he would, dissociated from Keats, be, at this late date and 
 in the inevitable pressure of more immediate and more 
 vital interests, only as it were a voice to charm those among 
 whom the personal tradition of the man is still more or less 
 potent. 
 
 It seemed to the present writer, therefore — as well as to 
 those who are also immediately concerned — that, from 
 every point of view, the wisest plan was to make the 
 
PREFACE. Vll 
 
 Memoirs in great part a record, in the first place of Severn's 
 youthful life, and his early intimacy with Keats; in the 
 second, of the whole episode of Keats and Severn in Italy, 
 with, to repeat a useful titular phrase, all interesting new 
 correspondence and often matter concerning ' Keats and 
 his Circle ; ' and, finally, of the last five-and-fifty years of 
 his long life, a life coloured and even directed from the 
 outset to the close by the abiding influence of the poet. 
 Naturally, again, with this biographical scheme, it was 
 thought best, at the expense of any arbitrary considerations 
 of proportion, to educe from the available new material as 
 much as possible relative to Severn's early years, friendship 
 with, and subsequent correspondence concerning Keats ; to 
 deal much more succinctly with the doings, experiences, 
 and. correspondence of Severn and his wide circle of dis- 
 tinguished friends, during the middle period of his life 
 (1830 till 1860) ; and to concentrate, within the extreme 
 practical limits, the record of what he justly viewed as the 
 eventful and interesting period of close upon twenty years 
 posterior to his return to Rome in 1861. Indeed, necessity 
 as well as judgment demanded the condensation of the 
 correspondence, and above all the minutely detailed and 
 uninterrupted diaries from 1860 onward ; for the alternative 
 was a record so ample that the fundamental scheme of the 
 Memoirs would be destroyed. 
 
 The only rival of Severn, in the minds of those who 
 revere the genius of Keats, is Charles Armitage Brown. 
 As many letters and part-letters by him have been quoted 
 as was found practicable ; a volume might easily be written 
 from the Brown-material alone. But, at any rate, even the 
 Keats-student will, in the following pages, gain a fuller 
 knowledge of Charles Armitage Brown's life and personality 
 than hitherto has been possible. The prevalent impression 
 seems to be that Brown was merely a man of independent 
 means and literary tastes; but he was, in truth, and of 
 
Vlll PREFACE. 
 
 • i 
 
 necessity, much more a professional man of letters than 
 were most of the minor members of the Keats-circle, 
 certainly not less, for instance, than was John Hamilton 
 Eeynolds, though Reynolds had a finer native talent and a 
 more distinctive expression. Brown's letters extend from 
 the days of his trip to Scotland with Keats to the year of 
 his death in New Zealand. They contain ample evidence 
 that he was at once a shrewd man of the world and an 
 impulsive enthusiast, loyal and unselfish in his affections, 
 bitter and often unreasonable in his dislikes, at all times 
 ready to resent an affront, real or imaginary, or to smoke 
 the pipe of peace whether as forgiver or as the forgiven. 
 But with all his hot head and warm heart he was an 
 excellent counsellor for others, and no one of his friends 
 benefited more by his good sense, discretion, and in- 
 telligent sympathy, than did Joseph Severn. Of his 
 writings nothing has survived, save his share in the 
 tragedy of Oiho, his ingenious and painstaking volume on 
 Shakespeare's life and genius, and, in another sense, that 
 MS. Memoir of Keats which is re-embodied in Lord 
 Houghton's ' Life ' of the poet. His early productions are 
 valueless, and even the humour of his comic opera 
 Narensky, is of that broad farcical kind which sounds so 
 flat to our ears. Some of his tales, and more particularly 
 his miscellaneous descriptive and critical papers, are credit- 
 able performances, and as a translator he is at once 
 sympathetic and able. It was a strong wish of his at one 
 time to render the whole of Goldoni's comedies into 
 English, and among his posthumous papers were many 
 translations, and a long and exhaustive critical study of the 
 Venetian dramatist. In his latter days in New Zealand he 
 often talked of writing his reminiscences, not only a more 
 detailed record of Keats, but of all the men of letters, 
 artists, and other interesting people whom he had known. 
 As he was a good raconteur, and a shepherd of all the 
 
PREFACE: IX 
 
 vagrant amusing stories of his day, it is a pity that he 
 postponed his work till too late. Every one who knew him 
 delighted in his company. Keats, as we know, rejoiced at a 
 letter from the friend whom, in well-known lines, he once 
 parodied as "a melancholy carle." Bailey, Eeynolds, 
 Haslam, had a high opinion of him, and he was esteemed 
 by Byron and Leigh Hunt and Samuel Bogers. There is 
 much in his letters that would no longer be of interest, 
 somewhat that is of too personal or private a nature to 
 be disengaged from the gossip of a bygone day, and occa- 
 sionally passages in that broader humour which has ceased 
 to please ; but in the main they are the letters of a gentle- 
 man and a good fellow, of a scholar and of a man of 
 quick sympathies and native insight. His indomitable 
 energy of mind and body (though not as a ' Russia 
 merchant,' retired or otherwise — for Brown's youthful ex- 
 periences in commerce were of the briefest, and consisted 
 chiefly in winding up the business which his father and 
 elder brother had suffered to decay) — this indomitable 
 energy was, no doubt, part secret of his power to refresh and 
 stimulate those whom he encountered as friends ;• a faculty 
 he had in no common degree, as Severn, who himself 
 possessed this happy gift, has emphatically and again and 
 again testified. 
 
 Certain words of the latter may fitly be quoted here, 
 applicable as they are to the person who uttered them as 
 well as to Charles Brown : — " One of the best fellows who 
 ever lived ; a creditable writer [painter] ; a natural wit ; a 
 man of the world in the best sense ; and possessed with a 
 happy genius for friendship." 
 
 It has been no easy task to select from the vast mass of 
 Severn's correspondence (and from his earliest days in Rome 
 he was a great letter-writer, though ever an irregular corre- 
 spondent) those letters and part-letters which seemed to bear 
 most directly on the matter in hand. No doubt much has 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 been omitted which, were it included, would interest many 
 readers ; on the other hand, it was obviously impossible to 
 satisfy all in this respect, and the MS. material was sifted 
 over and over to the end that no useful sidelights should be 
 lost, no really valuable matter be overlooked. Severn kept 
 most of the letters which were addressed to him, even when 
 these were mere notes of no other interest than that of the 
 moment ; and frequently he preserved the first drafts or 
 later copies of the epistles which he himself sent. 
 
 His biographer has, of course, primarily been indebted to 
 the great quantity of MSS. — letters to and from Severn 
 during a period of nearly sixty years ; reminiscences, frag- 
 mentary, and more complete, written at different times in 
 his life; and many volumes of scrupulously explicit 
 journals — placed in his hands by Mr. Walter Severn. 
 Thereafter he has to express his obligations to Mr. Charles 
 Severn, Joseph's younger brother, for much interesting 
 information of a personal nature, and again to him and to 
 Mr. Eayner Storr for their joint courtesy and assistance in 
 entrusting him with a large quantity of Severn's home- 
 letters for examination, excerption, or quotation. There 
 are so many persons to thank for all manner of aid that 
 it is best to make no attempt to specify each generous 
 collaborator ; but sincere acknowledgments are in particular 
 due to the friends and strangers, not only in this country 
 but also in America, and Italy — and above all to those in 
 Kome — who by loan of letters, communication of interesting 
 facts and anecdotes, and records and memoranda of various 
 kinds, have helped to animate what is even now a less 
 comprehensive and living portrait than the limner would 
 fain have wrought. 
 
 To already published writings he is also, of course, 
 indebted. The most important single book or article is 
 Severn's own paper in the Atlantic Monthly for 1863 on the 
 'Vicissitudes of Keats's Fame.' Thereafter should be 
 
PREFACE. XI 
 
 mentioned Mr. H. Buxton Forman's monumental edition 
 of ' Keats ' (to which, in particular, acknowledgments are 
 due in the instance of a few of Severn's letters or part- 
 letters, copied therefrom instead of from the originals) ; 
 Mr. Sidney Colvin's admirable monograph on Keats in the 
 English Men of Letters series, and to his delightful edition 
 of the poet's letters, a compilation edited with so much 
 patience and care, and distinguished by such discreet 
 sympathy and judgment, that it must be accepted as the 
 standard ' Letters of Keats ; ' and, almost needless to say,. 
 to Lord Houghton's original and revised " Memoirs." 
 Naturally all noteworthy writings bearing upon the per- 
 sonality, circle, or period of Keats have been consulted ; 
 but further specification would be as undesirable as it is 
 unnecessary. Finally, thanks are due to one or two literary 
 friends for advice on matters of detail, and for assistance in 
 research where a more or less arduous quest proved neces- 
 sary — and notably to Mr. Richard Garnett, LL.D., and to 
 Mr. G. K. Fortescue. 
 
 A word upon the portrait-illustrations in this volume. 
 The interesting silhouette of Keats is reproduced for the 
 first time. The original, in the possession of Mr. Walter 
 Severn, was discovered only within the last few years, 
 having been accounted lost or destroyed at a period long 
 anterior. To all Keats-students it will have a particular 
 value ; and specialists will note those indications of strength 
 which are inconspicuous in certain familiar likenesses of 
 the poet. The vignette-head of Keats, on the title-page, is 
 not after the early miniature, but a reproduction of a late 
 drawing ; the latest portrait, indeed, which in his old age 
 Severn made. Rightly or wrongly, he was wont to declare 
 that it represented the poet as he commonly was ; it is 
 certainly different in several respects from the well-known 
 engraving after the earlier miniature, which stands as a 
 frontispiece to Lord Houghton's 'Life' of Keats. The 
 
XI 1 PREFACE. 
 
 pathetic sketch of Keats in the extremity of his last illness 
 is already known to every lover of the poet's work. The 
 original is one of the finest things Severn ever did, and 
 though it has necessarily lost much in process of repro- 
 duction, it will still, to those who look upon it — with the 
 eyelids closed as they are in mortal weakness, and the hair 
 matted with the dews of coming death — give that touching 
 sense of nearness to the dying poet which so many have felt. 
 Another instance of loss in reproduction is the engraving 
 after the autograph portrait of Severn. Here certain fea- 
 tures are too pronounced, and the more youthful look of the 
 original drawing has evaded the translator. Fortunately, 
 Seymour Kirkup's beautiful drawing of Severn, made early 
 in 1822, and depicting him as Keats must have known him, 
 has been admirably reproduced. It is further interesting as 
 the handiwork of an eminent man and an artist who has 
 scarcely had his meed of recognition. When one looks at 
 this portrait of Severn in the prime of his early manhood, 
 it is easy to understand how readily he fascinated men as 
 well as women by his good looks and grace of manner, and 
 how it was that in his early days in Rome his ' head ' was 
 so often ' taken ' by his fellow-artists. It is quite likely 
 that, in common with all Seymour Kirkup's portrait- work, 
 this likeness is somewhat idealised; the artist himself, 
 however, thought it a rivid portrayal of his friend as he was 
 in the early Twenties. At a first glance, there is not much 
 in common between this portrait by Kirkup and Severn's 
 autograph likeness, though they belong to the same period 
 of his life — even when allowance is made for the different 
 way in which the long hair is brushed; but even here a 
 similarity may be traced in the eyes and still more 
 obviously in the mouth. In the originals the likeness is 
 more readily recognisable. 
 
 It may be added that the illustration in the last chapter, 
 that depicting the graves of Keats and Severn, is from a 
 
PBEFJGE. xiii 
 
 recent photograph, taken at a time when the interwoven 
 clusters of violets grew as thickly as tangled grasses. 
 
 On one point, it seems necessary to add a few words. 
 Severn had a capricious memory, and was at no time 
 heedful of the exact verity of his statements. Thus it is 
 that one set of reminiscences will sometimes contradict the 
 other, and that even letters written in the same month 
 (occasionally, on or about the same day), will be at variance 
 in matters of more or less importance. The same picture 
 will be variously sold at £70, or £100, or £150 ; the same 
 event will occur " this year," or " last autumn," or " a few 
 years ago ; " this friendship or that acquaintanceship will 
 date confusedly now from a period anterior to the writer's 
 first encounter with the person concerned ; now from a year 
 or month when intimacy had long been established. In 
 advanced age the old painter's memory often played him 
 strange tricks, though in the very last years of his life his 
 remembrance of the days of his youth grew clearer and 
 more intensified, and much, it seemed, that he had for- 
 gotten in early manhood or middle-age, came back to him. 
 It was this that underlay his exclatoation in his eighty-fifth 
 year, that he was fortunate among men in literally 
 recovering in his old age his lost ^outh. A good reason, 
 accordingly, is afforded for a certain suspicion of any 
 positive affirmation in Severn's letters, reminiscences, or 
 conversations ; without verification, or, at least, considera- 
 tion, one might easily be led to false conclusions. Possibly 
 some of the Keats-anecdotes he used to narrate in his latter 
 years were either coloured, or actually treated, by retro- 
 spective imagination ; on the other hand, he was so reverent 
 of the genius and dear fame of his belove\l friend that, in 
 narration,. he would not consciously derogate from the facts. 
 A friend informed the present writer that the first time he 
 heard Severn tell a new story about Keats he would doubt 
 its all-round veracity ; that on the second telling he would 
 
XIV PREFACE. 
 
 think it- was probably true in all essentials ; and that if the 
 story ever reached a third presentment, " it was certain to 
 be an absolutely trustworthy record." So far, the present 
 biographer has, in many like instances, followed this 
 rough-and-ready means of judgment ; that is, he has 
 utilised no anecdote or reminiscence which did not seem to 
 bear upon it the impress of actuality, or could in some 
 degree be borne out. 
 
 In the same way that he has purposely refrained from 
 dwelling on much of Severn's private life during the fifty 
 years that followed his marriage — convinced that with the 
 sayings and doings of Joseph Severn as a private indi- 
 vidual, the public had no concern — he has also neglected 
 many opportunities to diverge into mere gossip, and omitted 
 much of personal family interest, which he need not have 
 done were he a relative of Severn and engaged on a 
 memoir practically intended for private circulation. Yet 
 there is one point of general interest which should not be 
 disregarded: the strong hereditary aesthetic strain in the 
 Severn family — an inheritance exemplified in divers ways, 
 but always notably. As stated in the early pages of the 
 following Memoir, the father of Joseph Severn had a native 
 love of pictorial art, and was, for a prolonged [period, a 
 teacher of music, a science which he almost passionately 
 admired. His wife, too, loved it as one of the best things 
 in life ; and in her judgment, both of music and painting, 
 showed an exacting refinement which, no doubt, was in 
 some degree due to the French strain which she inherited 
 from her Huguenot grandparents. Of the sons of their 
 marriage, as noted at page 5 hereafter, Joseph became 
 eminent as a painter, and might have won repute as a 
 musician ; Thomas was a popular composer ; and Mr. 
 Charles Severn was, for more than fifty years, a musician of 
 high standing, the associate of the most eminent composers 
 singers, and executants of his time, and in his old a^e still 
 
PREFACE. XV 
 
 delights in his nominal vocation as organist. The lady 
 whom Joseph Severn married, though not an artist, had a 
 keen sense of colour and form, and was, moreover, a woman 
 of culture and refinement, native and inherited. Of their 
 six children, three were girls : Claudia, Mary, and Eleanor. 
 Of these only the third (Mrs. Furneaux) survives, and 
 shares in no slight degree, not only the family love of Art, 
 but, in particular, that of her twin-brother, Mr. Arthur 
 Severn, whose name is so familiar as that of a painter of 
 much originality, power, and poetic insight. Claudia 
 Fitzroy Severn married Mr. Frederick Gale, so well known 
 to cricket enthusiasts, and died in 1874 ; in her, the 
 aesthetic strain betrayed itself in a delicate love and under- 
 standing of music. The second daughter, Mary, showed 
 exceptional promise as an artist ; some of her drawings had 
 a refinement and grace which proved her possession of a 
 strong and original talent ; but, subsequent to her marriage 
 with Mr., now Sir Charles, Newton, she died untimely in 
 1866. Of the three sons of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Severn, 
 Mr. Walter Severn, the eldest, has already had a long and 
 distinguished career as an artist ; and in the craft of letters, 
 also, has proved that he has inherited something of that 
 literary faculty which his father had in a secondary degree. 
 It would be altogether inappropriate foi; the present writer to 
 dwell upon the life and achievement of Mr. Walter Severn ; 
 while, as an artist, what better word ctiuld be said of him 
 than has already generously been uttered by Mr. Euskin ?* 
 The same reasons obviously apply in the instance of Joseph 
 Severn's youngest son, Arthur, to whom allksion has already 
 been made. Born in London in 1841, Mr. Arthur Severn 
 is now in the prime of life, and is fortunate in having 
 sustained and enhanced the high repute which he won at 
 ah early age. This is neither the time nor, the place to 
 dwell upon his devotion to the illustrious friend, of whom he 
 * Vide Letter of March 26th, 1875, quoted at p. 219, post. 
 
XVI PREFACE. 
 
 has been the intimate companion for many years, but it is 
 significant that, with much else, he has inherited that 
 genius for devoted friendship which was the good fortune 
 of his father's life.* 
 
 The late Henry Augustus Severn was a man of ex- 
 ceptional intellectual energy. Ill health interfered to some 
 extent with what promised to be a brilliant scientific career, 
 and in 1884 his constitution yielded to a prolonged strain. 
 The eldest of Mr. Walter Severn's six children has also shown 
 a marked scientific bias, and is now a member of the Koyal 
 College of Science. Two other sons perpetuate the family 
 tradition ; Mr. Nigel and Mr. Cecil Severn — the latter at 
 present a midshipman on board the Immortalite, whence 
 he has sent to the ' Daily Graphic ' and elsewhere, clever 
 sketches of naval life and marine experiences. It is not 
 often that an artistic strain is at once so dispersed and 
 so strenuous throughout three generations. 
 
 In a sense the writer of this ' Life of Severn ' may repeat 
 what Lord Houghton wrote of his Memoir of Keats : " I 
 came to the conclusion that it was best to act simply as 
 Editor of the Life which was, as it were, already written." 
 He hopes that, at any rate, he has educed from the mass of 
 material at his disposal enough to give an adequate idea of 
 the life and achievement of his subject, and to make the 
 personality of Joseph Severn live again. The story, at least, 
 of an immortal friendship has for the first time been set forth 
 in full detail. That friendship, as Severn was ever the first 
 to recognise, was the golden gate whence issued the success 
 and happiness of his life ; and in the shadow of death, as in 
 life, he turned his eyes longingly towards it. Sic itur ad 
 astra. 
 
 William Sharp. 
 
 * Mr. Arthur Severn married a lady who is a cousin of Mr. Ruskin, 
 and for many years the three have been one family, residing together at 
 Brantwood, Coniston. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Early training — Boyhood vicissitudes — Apprentice to an engraver — 
 Beginnings in Art — Rivalries — Mrs. Siddons as Queen Katherine 
 — First steps to success .. .. .. .. .. .. 1 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 First meeting with Keats — Letter from Geo. Keats Keats's ap- 
 pearance — Country walks with Keats — His first picture — Arduous 
 studies — ' The Cave of Despair ' — Letters from Keats — Severn 
 gains the Gold Medal — Keats-reminiscences — Haydon's famous 
 dinner-party — Severn and Hyperion and Lamia — Earliest version 
 of Keats's ' Fingal's Cave ' — Death of Tom Keats — Miss Fanny 
 Brawne — The Ode to a Nightingale — Keats and the Elgin 
 Marbles — Keats's first collapse — Keats's decision to go to Italy 16 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 Severn's Art prospects — Haslam asks Severn to go with Keats — 
 Severn decides to go with Keats — A gloomy departure — Sailing 
 of the Maria Crowther — Keats's last poem — Incidents of the 
 voyage — In quarantine in the Bay of Naples — Keats and Severn 
 in Naples — Keats's indignation in Naples — Keats and Severn 
 in Rome — Their early life in Rome — Keats's relapse . . . . 45 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Letter from Haslam about Keats — Letters from Haslam and Chas. 
 Armitage Brown — Miss Brawne and Keats — Letter to Mrs. 
 Brawne — Keats's mortal illness — A brief rally — Severn's death- 
 bed portrait of Keats — " He for his death: and I for his life " — 
 Leigh Hunt's letter about Keats — Long letter to Mrs. Brawne — 
 Keats's last days — Letter to Haslam — Death of Keats — His 
 burial — Severn's many troubles — Miss Brawne and Keats's death 
 — Notable letters from Brown and Mr. Taylor — Preparations for 
 a biography— Keats's will— Severn after Keats's death .. .. 71 
 
 I 
 
XV111 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Keats-reminiscences — ' The Death of Alcibiades' and other Art- 
 work — Wm. Ewing — Seymour Kirkup and Sir Geo. Beaumont 
 — Chas. Eastlake — Keatsiana — Letters from Severn and Taylor 
 — Letter from Charles Brown — Brown's reasons for opposing 
 Taylor — Severn gains the travelling-pension — Severn and Samuel 
 Sogers — Reminiscences of Shelley — Shelley's influence on Keats 
 — Shelley, Keats, and Severn — The * Adonais ' Preface — Edward 
 Trelawny — Burial of Shelley's ashes .. .. .. .. 102 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 A vision of ' Endymion ' — Letter from Edward Holmes — Charles 
 Brown comes to Italy — Correspondence — Leigh Hunt : Byron : 
 Keats — Letter from Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.R.A. — The ' Greek 
 Shepherds ' and other Art-work — The Keats-monument project 
 — First impressions of Trelawny — Letter from Leigh Hunt — 
 Severn goes to Venice — His growing repute as an artist — Severn 
 as a musician .. .. .. .. .. .. .. 125 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Letter from Richard Westmacott — Brown's new home — Severn goes 
 
 to the Alban hills Massimo d'Azeglio — Severn's friendships 
 
 through Keats — Mr. Ruskin, Mr. Gladstone, &c. — Letter from 
 Charles Brown about Geo. Keats — Goes with Lady Westmorland 
 to ' Naples— Miss Cotterell again — His life in Rome — Gibson : 
 "Westmacott : Seymour Kirkup : Hazlitt, &c— Severn meets his 
 future wife — A strange story of Papal Rome — A terrible tragedy 
 — Severn's marriage — Letter from Trelawny — The projected 
 Keats-memorial— Letters from Severn about Keats — Severn's 
 wish to see ' Otho ' acted — Eager for a monument to Keats — 
 Prolific in Art-work — Birth of Walter Severn— Severn's famous 
 cathedral-picture— His prosperity— Letters from Brown and R. 
 Westmacott — Severn and Sir Walter Scott — Brown meets 
 Monckton Milnes — Letter from Leigh Hunt . . . . . . 14 1 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 The Keats-memorial— Brown's memoir of Keats — The "Great 
 Plague" in Rome — Severn-correspondence — Tragic death of 
 Severn's child— Charles Dilke and Charles Lamb — Letter from 
 
 Sir Charles Eastlake— Letter from George Richmond, R.A. 
 
 Letter from Charles Brown— Keats's possible biographers— Last 
 news of Charles Brown — His death in New Zealand— Letter from 
 Mr. Dilke — Keats and " fame " .. .. .. .. J77 
 
CONTENTS. XIX 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Severn's life in London — Keats's dying bequest to Severn — The 
 Westminster Cartoons — Letters from Mr. Gladstone and Mary 
 Shelley — Portraits of Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Monckton Milnes — 
 Death of Easlam — Letter from Venice from Mr. Ruskin — Letter 
 from " Geo. Gordon Byron " — Severn's frescoes and other Art- 
 work — Letter from Mr. Ruskin about Christian Art — Severn's 
 ' Folio-Adonais ' — The vacant Consulship at Rome — Correspond- 
 ence — Severn appointed Consul — Letters from Mr. Ruskin . . 201 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 Joseph Severn's miscellaneous writings. 
 
 Mr. Ruskin on the East wind — ' Imaginary Letters ' — ' Michel Angelo 
 to Vittoria Colonna ' — ' Fra Savonarola to Pra Bartolomeo ' — 
 ' Galileo to Milton ' — ' Light and Sound : A New Theory ' — 
 ' Divine origin of the octave ' — Severn's story : ' The Pale Bride ' — 
 Severn's novel : ' The Dead Hand ' — Projected novel : ' The 
 Lost Throne' 221 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 Return to Rome — Severn and Keats — Meeting with and Letters from 
 Keats's sister, Mme. de Llanos — Letters from Geo. Keats's Grand- 
 son — Letters from Chas. Cowden Clarke — Variants of the Keats- 
 miniature — Letter from Alfred Domett — A strange Trelawny 
 Letter — Letters from S. Kirkup — Strange conduct at St. Peter's 
 — An amusing letter — Keats's Letters to Miss Brawne — Letters 
 from J. T. Fields— Severn and the " Letters " 248 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Severn's Consular years — Severn's latter days — Mr. Ruskin's encomia 
 — Death of Joseph Severn — Suggestions for Severn's grave- 
 stone — Severn and his contemporaries — The ' Endymion ' picture 
 — Keats and Severn buried side by side .. .. .. .. 275 
 
 Appendices to Chapter VII. (I. and II.) .. .. .. 289 
 
 Appendix to Chapter XII. — "A Reminiscence of Severn" .. 301 
 
 Index .. ,. 304 
 
ILLUSTKATIONS. 
 
 I. Frontispiece. Portrait op Severn [1822], 
 By Seymour Kirkup. 
 II. Portrait of Keats from an Unpublished 
 
 Picture by Severn .... Title-page. 
 
 III. Silhouette of Keats .... To face page 34 
 
 IV. Facsimile of Page of Severn's Journal on 
 
 board the Maria Orowther . . „ 55 
 V. Facsimile of Unfinished Letter (24th Dec. 
 
 1820) . 80 
 
 VI. Drawing of Keats in his last Illness . „ ,. 84 
 
 VII. Facsimile of Letter from Leigh Hunt . . „ „ , 87 
 VIII. Mourning Figure (in an unfinished Letter 
 
 by Severn) „ „ 94 
 
 IX. Drawing of a Lady of Genzano . . „ „ 144 
 
 X. Group from the 'Italian Fountain' . „ ., 151 
 
 XI. Group for 'A Pastoral' . . . . „ „ 153 
 XII. Study of Central Figure in ' Sicilian 
 
 Mariner's Hymn' . . . . ,, ,, 167 
 
 XIII. Mother and Child, from the 'Eoman 
 
 Ave Maria ' ..... , „ 179 
 
 XIV. Earliest Study of 'Ariel Aflight' ,, „ 210 
 XV. Autograph Portrait of Severn . . „ ., 248 
 
 XVI. The Graves of Severn and Keats . . „ „ 252 
 
 XVII. Study for the Picture of ' Ariel Aflight ' , 272 
 
LIFE AND FBIENDSHIPS 
 
 OF 
 
 JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 Early training — Boyhood vicissitudes — Apprentice to an engraver — 
 Beginnings in Art — Rivalries — Mrs. Siddons as Queen Katherine — 
 First steps to success. 
 
 The name Severn, writes Mr. Freeman in a private letter, 
 •" is a curious bit of philology. The Welsh is Safren, or 
 some such name, which is said to mean divider or frontier 
 stream. The Lake Sabrinas is according to a very old 
 analogy, by which the initial h in Welsh, as in Greek, 
 answers to initial s in Latin. The puzzling thing is that a 
 law of change of that sort should be applied at so late a 
 stage of the language. It is possible that the modern 
 Welsh form may be later than the Eoman Conquest, as in 
 old Greek we find <rv<; for 5?. But, as I am not a Celtic 
 scholar, I do not much like guessing at these things." 
 
 The Severns were a family of good West-country stock, 
 for several generations settled by the banks of the Severn 
 in Gloucestershire. In the latter half of the eighteenth 
 century trouble came to them and caused the wide 
 scattering of what had been almost a clan. One member 
 of the family settled in Bedfordshire, and his eldest son, 
 James, was the father of Joseph Severn. Mr. James Severn 
 married a Miss Littel, belonging to an old Huguenot 
 
LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 family, and shortly before his marriage definitely adopted, 
 owing to a collapse in the small remaining family fortunes, 
 the profession of music. Mr. Severn was a man of an 
 excitable and somewhat flighty temperament, with native, 
 though untrained aesthetic tastes. He was fortunate in his 
 wife, a woman whose comeliness was only less remark- 
 able than her sweetness of nature and alert sympathy. 
 Despite her husband's headstrong temper, their life seems 
 to have been a happy one. The Severns are a long-living 
 family, and Miss Littel brought to that strenuous stock her 
 share of the proverbial hardihood of the Huguenots; for, 
 through troublous times, she preserved her notable vigour 
 and serenity, and survived to a great age. Her eldest son 
 lived to his eighty-sixth year ; one of her daughters died 
 three or four years ago, well on in her eighth decade ; her 
 youngest son, Mr. Charles Severn, after a long and honour- 
 able career as a musician, is happily still living, and as 
 active at the age of eighty-six as are most men younger 
 than he by a score of years. 
 
 Early in 1793 Mr. and Mrs. Severn settled in Hoxton, 
 then a somewhat remote village to the north of London, 
 and there, on the 7th of December in the same year (not in 
 1796 as sometimes stated), the eldest of their six children 
 was born, and duly christened Joseph. The boy was pre- 
 cocious, for while still a child of five he drew a portrait of 
 his father. The drawing was in profile, and was sufficiently 
 good to attract more general attention than infantile 
 attempts generally do ; indeed, an artist friend of Mr. Severn 
 declared that it was, in everything except firmness, ex- 
 cellent. One of the hobbies of the lad's father was to 
 collect old pictures at local and second-rate Metropolitan 
 sales, and though in one of his MS. confessions his son 
 irreverentially alludes to the " rubbishy old pictures which 
 [his father] was always picking up when other people dropped 
 'em'," he admits that this paternal fancy, and the tolerable 
 and intolerable pictures themselves, helped to educate his 
 own latent sense of line, mass, and colour. Pather and son 
 were companionable while Joseph was but a child ; in great 
 
EARLY TRAINING. 
 
 part, as the latter admits, because he was never tired 
 of staring up at the canvas treasures (which came and 
 went with almost tidal regularity), and of listening to 
 explanations of their subjects or expositions of their merits. 
 
 As soon as Mr. Severn became convinced that his first- 
 born possessed an exceptional faculty, he lost no opportunity 
 of assisting its development. He helped the boy with 
 hints in the elements of drawing and composition, and 
 sometimes took him for a walk into the country, where he 
 would point out a cottage, or a hamlet clustered under 
 tall elms, or a wayside inn nestling like a huge white- 
 and-red-strawberry among a mass of foliage, and explain 
 the value and methods of pictorial selection. Occasionally 
 he would insist on the boy's attempting one of these familiar 
 subjects ; once, for instance, at Tottenham, he prevailed on 
 him to sketch an- ivy-mantled cottage, for which purpose 
 he borrowed a stool from the old lady who occupied 
 the cottage, who watched the child with an astonishment 
 which culminated in profound admiration followed by 
 profuse offers of cake. 
 
 He was, moreover, a good story-teller, and held his 
 children entranced with historical tales : sometimes he 
 would simulate the personages of whom he spoke, as when 
 he so impressed the imagination of his firstborn by his re- 
 presentation of the ' Ghost ' in Samlet that Joseph made, 
 though in fear and trembling, a drawing of the gruesome 
 apparition. Occasionally these peaceful interludes were 
 momentarily broken by swift wrath at some misdeed of the 
 precocious Joseph, when Mr. Severn would inflict unexpected 
 chastisement with bewildering suddenness. Nevertheless, 
 these summary punishments caused no feud between father 
 and son, and in the main the boy seems to have been brought 
 up wisely enough. The long walks in the country were 
 good for body as well as for artistic training, and as the lad 
 grew older his father was wont to take him with him to the 
 various country-houses where he taught music, and show 
 him the pictures and tell him particulars of the painters. 
 Sometimes Joseph showed originality in his drawings, as 
 
 b 2 
 
LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 when he painted " a bright gamboge glory all round the 
 coffin " in his drawing of the Nelson Car. This, however, 
 must have been when he was no longer a child : and it was 
 before he passed into his teens that some of his father's 
 patrons noticed the drawings which Mr. Severn often took 
 an opportunity of displaying, and encouraged the boy to 
 persevere. In later life Severn was wont to attribute to his 
 mother all his heritance of good qualities, and to her, 
 certainly, he owed his joyous serenity of temperament : yet 
 to his father, except in the matter of temper, he bore distinct 
 resemblance. From him he inherited his most characteristic 
 traits — sudden enthusiasms, swift emotions, personal vanity, 
 with extremes of self-depreciation. 
 
 Mr. Severn deserves credit for having discerned his son's 
 artistic tendencies, and for having done his best to cultivate 
 them. Even when a mere child, the boy's education in this 
 respect was not neglected, for drawings, engravings, and 
 picture-books were frequently lent to him : and so keen was 
 the lad's pleasure in these that, when given him at night, 
 ne used to go to bed early so as to " get up at dawn to 
 devour them." Some of Severn's kindly-worded complaints 
 against his father, therefore, must not be taken too literally ; 
 the " hardness " to which he more than once alludes was no 
 very severe infliction after all — even the casual chastise- 
 ments already alluded to, seem to have had no ill- 
 results, and, as Mr. Whistler says of an apologetic critic's 
 remarks, were "meant friendly." Moreover, as he fully 
 admits, his father had several excellent qualities. He was 
 thoughtful for his family despite his extravagances ; he was 
 generous, in the fullest sense of the word ; and he invariably 
 set an example of scrupulous honesty. His inability to bear 
 contradiction was a cause of frequent disturbance, particu- 
 larly as his children grew older ; and no doubt here he had 
 only himself to blame. Devoted to his wife, and not averse 
 from domestic existence, he was something of the household- 
 tyrant, for he would allow no domestic work to be done in 
 his presence, and kept no restraint upon his anger if one 
 of his children made any noise. Withal, he had the virtue 
 
BOYHOOD VICISSITUDES. 
 
 of industry, and displayed rare ingenuity in everything con- 
 cerning the science of music and musical instruments.* It 
 was well for Joseph Severn that he had so good a mother to 
 counteract the somewhat too eccentric influences of his 
 father, particularly as he seems to have been anything hut 
 a tractable youngster. Again and again in his " reminis- 
 cences," journals, and letters, he refers to his mother as his 
 guardian-angel, as a woman of incomparable tact and rare 
 sweetness of nature. From various accounts, it is clear that 
 her charm of manner was peculiarly winsome. To her 
 son she was something holy almost, and often in after 
 years he wrought into the faces of the Madonnas whom he 
 painted the expression of the mother whom he loved so 
 well and reverenced so deeply. Among those who were 
 almost equally impressed by the beauty of Mrs. Severn's 
 character was Keats, who loved his own mother with 
 passionate affection, and mourned her death, when he was 
 in his fifteenth year, with poignant grief, f 
 
 Young Severn went through the usual vicissitudes of 
 boyhood. It is needless to follow him in detail through his 
 diffuse and discursive early reminiscences : it will suffice to 
 refer to one or two incidents. During the celebration of the 
 Victory of Trafalgar, the lad, enthusiastic for Nelson and 
 the glory of a naval career, ran away from home ; an act 
 which had an untimely, not to say an ignominious ending, 
 for, overcome with fatigue when but a short distance from 
 home, he sank by the wayside and fell asleep by a post. 
 There his alarmed parents found him, and so practical 
 
 * Unquestionably his three sons derived their musical faculties from 
 him. Joseph, as he was assured again and again, might have been as 
 successful as a composer as a painter ; Mr. Charles Severn has won 
 deserved repute ; and their brother, Thomas, was a popular composer as 
 well as a good executant. 
 
 t In the MS. of " Early Kemembrances," Severn records a statement of 
 Keats, " that his great misfortune had been that from his infancy he had 
 no mother." There is palpable forgetfulness, or confusion of some kind, 
 here. Probably Severn, who did not become acquainted with Keats till 
 after his mother's death, believed that Mrs. Rawlings (for she had 
 married again) had died during his friend's infancy, or perhaps that she 
 was but Keats's step-mother, and remembered or misapprehended some 
 casual remark by the poet. 
 
LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 was his father's argument that he did not again attempt 
 surreptitious flight. Of an emotional and imaginative tem- 
 perament, he seems to have been permanently impressed by 
 a tragic incident which occurred in his eighth year. He had 
 gone with a schoolmate named Cole to bathe in some 
 water-filled gravel-pits, and in one of them his companion 
 ventured beyond his depth and was drowned. There was 
 no one near at the time, so the child had to watch his 
 comrade perish, and then to make his way home, carrying 
 the drowned boy's clothes, and break the news to Mrs. Cole. 
 No doubt his extreme horror of sudden death was in great 
 part due to this experience. 
 
 When Joseph was in his fifteenth year his father began 
 to look about for some suitable vocation for him. If he 
 had been able he would have himself instructed Joseph 
 in the technique of Art, but notwithstanding his mania for 
 collecting and dispersing old pictures, he had little trained 
 taste or knowledge, and could not draw in the least. An 
 artistic education for his son was altogether beyond his 
 means. Entering his house one day, and seeing Joseph 
 engaged in copying with great accuracy some old plate, it 
 occurred to him that he could not do better than apprentice 
 the boy to an engraver. Here again the question of means 
 nearly brought about the abandonment of the project, for in 
 almost every instance a premium was asked, varying from 
 £100 to £300. At last Mr. Severn saw an advertisement 
 which promised more satisfactorily, for no premium was 
 demanded, but only an undertaking as to board and partial 
 lodging. The advertiser was Mr. William Bond, whom 
 Severn describes as " an engraver in the chalk manner," and 
 who was then engaged in reproducing some paintings by 
 Singleton. Young Severn had never drawn from oil 
 pictures, and was delighted ; moreover, in comparison with 
 the canvases he was accustomed to see in his father's house 
 those at Mr. Bond's seemed to him works of high art. In 
 a word, he was fascinated by the novel artistic atmosphere, 
 and, inexperienced as he was, imagined that with Mr. William 
 Bond as guide he would soon become an artist. 
 
APPRENTICE TO AN ENGRAVER. 
 
 Mr. Bond, on his part, was satisfied with the drawings 
 which Mr. Severn showed him, particularly with one of the 
 Ghost in Hamlet, and agreed to take Joseph as an appren- 
 tice for seven years on his father's guarantee as to the 
 fulfilment of the stipulations concerning partial board and 
 accommodation. 
 
 It was an important change for the young would-be artist, 
 no doubt, and perhaps may have been more influential for 
 good than he was ever willing to allow. Yet it was the 
 beginning of a long period of fret and unhappiness. In his 
 own words, he " was popped unwittingly into slavery, and 
 doomed to stab copper for seven long years." In the first 
 few months he was well content, for though he had some 
 qualms at being so rigidly bound by the indenture, after 
 he had made such rapid progress that Mr. Bond became 
 anxious lest so promising a pupil should leave his service, 
 he rejoiced in his new surroundings and comparatively 
 congenial work. After some months of exercises in 
 drawing, chiefly in copying in Indian ink prints by 
 Bartolozzi, he was set " to stab the copper." At first this 
 interested him greatly, and he was an apt pupil; but 
 when he wished to devote himself more exclusively to 
 drawing, Mr. Bond held him to the terms of the agreement, 
 and in every way discouraged all original effort. A feeling 
 of resentment towards the engraver grew in young Severn's 
 mind, unjustifiably in some respects, for Mr. Bond had 
 bargained for an assistant in his trade and not for the 
 superintendence of an ambitious and restless young artist ; 
 though, on the other hand, neither he nor Mr. Severn seems 
 to have made the youth clearly understand the nature of 
 the indenture. 
 
 It was about this time, however, that he began to find 
 some solace in the study of literature. The " epics and 
 histories" which he read eagerly in his few periods of 
 leisure when he could not be working at his drawings 
 further stimulated his inventive faculty. The desire to 
 create became almost a passion, and slowly he began to feel 
 his way towards independent accomplishment, though as 
 
8' LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 he had never been able to work in colour save with Indian 
 ink or at best with indifferent water colours, he was conscious 
 of his painful limitations. Occasionally he rebelled against 
 his circumstances, and it was all his parents could do to 
 persuade him that he would be foolish as well as wrong 
 to desert the honourable trade to which he had been 
 apprenticed. Ultimately Mr. Bond consented to his pupil's- 
 having some more time to himself for purposes of recreation 
 as well as of study, for the boy's health was delicate. 
 
 Severn's arduous, if intermittent, studies enabled him 
 to learn one invaluable lesson for a young artist, namely 
 that his ignorance was out of all proportion to his aspira- 
 tions, and more than this, that he had much to unlearn as 
 well as to acquire. Sometimes there were pictures to be 
 engraved which were really works of art, and from these, 
 and his effort to reproduce them in monochrome or water- 
 colours, he perceived wherein he fell short, as well as obtained 
 glimpses of the goal towards which he was fain to strive. 
 Among these pictures he particularly mentions a ' Laughing 
 Girl,' by Sir Joshua Keynolds, and a Portrait of himself by 
 the great artist. He also refers to a fine painting of Lord 
 Stafford by Yandyke, which, he says, was offered to Mr, 
 Severn for 21., an offer declined by his father, who " cared, 
 for nothing in Art except landscape." Untrained as he was,, 
 Joseph Severn at once recognised the beauty of the old, 
 picture, and for haK-a-crown persuaded the dealer to let him 
 take it home to copy. The copy was duly valued at Hoxton, 
 not so much for its artistic merits as because it bore a strik- 
 ing resemblance to the head of the household. Twenty "years 
 later, when Severn returned from Eome on a visit to London,, 
 he saw at the British Institution this identical picture — r 
 " one of the finest specimens of the master, which had been 
 foolishly lost owing to my father's ignorance of Art." 
 
 As his small circle of acquaintances extended, and with 
 the renewed hope and artistic energy which were the result 
 of his occasional holidays, Severn's health began to improve. 
 The long walk to and fro between Hoxton and Newman, 
 Street, in all weathers ; insufficient and monotonous diet ; 
 
BEGINNINGS IN ART. 9 
 
 and the deep discontent which possessed him — one and all 
 had wrought upon him to such an extent that he feared he 
 could not endure the strain for long. But when he found 
 himself free every now and again to do as he willed, his 
 spirits rose, and all threatenings of a decline passed away. 
 On these holidays (granted at first on condition that he 
 would be more assiduous in his apprentice-work at other 
 times), he frequently painted small portraits in water- 
 colours, at the rate of half-a-guinea apiece, and the money 
 thus obtained was spent on the materials of his craft and on 
 books. He became, indeed, an eager student: for, more 
 and more conscious of his ignorance, he set himself to self- 
 instruction, not only in belles-lettres and history, but in 
 mathematics, with rare and uncertain wanderings into the 
 unknown ways of other sciences. But as time went on, and 
 he found that he was no longer really gaining ground, and 
 as, moreover, he realised keenly how fatal for him was his 
 lack of training in anatomical study and drawing, he deter- 
 mined at all hazards to become a member of the Royal 
 Academy student classes. A long time elapsed, however, 
 before he gained his point. A drawing that he made, of 
 ' Joseph interpreting the Butler's and the Baker's dreams,' 
 seems to have been instrumental in convincing Mr. Bond 
 that it would be best to let the youth find his level, whatever 
 that was to be. 
 
 From this time forward Severn made rapid progress in 
 the preliminaries of his art. When at home he lost no 
 opportunity of useful experience, and he makes particular 
 mention of one undertaking which helped him in no slight 
 measure. For a long period, he says, " I was engaged at 
 home making a little theatre. All the scenes were carefully 
 drawn and painted, both in architecture and landscape ; 
 then the figures were equally well studied in cardboard, and 
 in this way my ingenuity was called forth and many good 
 opportunities afforded of learning not exactly to draw, but 
 of knowing how much I wanted to learn, how much I needed 
 to acquire." But all this enthusiasm and determination was 
 looked at askance by Mr. Severn, who could not believe 
 
10 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 that his son had sufficient talent to enable him to overcome 
 the apparently insuperable obstacles to success, and thought 
 his indifference to the engraver's trade as foolish as it was 
 reprehensible. In vain he pointed out that a master-engraver 
 was an artist, and that there was artistic scope for the ablest 
 draughtsman in so worthy a profession. His son replied 
 that it might be the finest calling on earth, but was not to 
 his liking, as even the finest engravings the world had 
 seen were interpretative and not creative, and that he wanted 
 to create, and to have free scope for his development to that 
 end. The seven, or rather eight, years that were passed in 
 more or less close apprenticeship to the art of " stabbing 
 copper," were undoubtedly hurtful to Severn in other 
 respects than by occupying the best years of his youth 
 with labour at once enforced and alien to his tastes, 
 and by circumscribing his opportunities for drawing 
 and anatomical study. For the long apprenticeship 
 meant all manner of adverse influences upon both his 
 mental and physical development. He had no time for 
 healthy exercise, little leisure for reading, and that at the 
 expense of his already tired eyesight, and of his almost 
 exhausted stock of energy ; and, moreover, such reading as 
 he could manage was haphazard, and so sometimes calculated 
 to cause mental confusion rather than aid his intellectual 
 growth. "The years of youth are as a mirror, fore- 
 shadowing the years to come," says an Oriental proverb ; 
 and with some such sentiment Severn closes the first section 
 of his earliest reminiscences. No after-care, he says in 
 effect, can absolutely readjust the balance lost through the 
 expenditure in a wrong direction of those years of youth 
 which should be bartered to a particular end with a heed at 
 once scrupulous and far-seeing. " Owing to those limited 
 beginnings," he admits, " I may perhaps have been induced 
 since to undertake works that were rather the effect of love 
 than skill, of enthusiasm than judgment. This may have 
 been always an evil for me." It undoubtedly was, and credit 
 is due to him for the self-criticism. Indeed, throughout life 
 Severn was a strange mixture of childlike vanity, genuine 
 
RIVALRIES. ] 1 
 
 humility, high aims and ambitious efforts, with accom- 
 plishment often far short; profound belief in himself 
 and his artistic calling, combined with swift readiness 
 to see and admit his shortcomings ; of a habitual self- 
 criticism ranging from generous apologetics or depreciatory 
 condemnations to a calm survey of facts and judicious 
 estimates. 
 
 The evening art-classes, however, though serviceable, 
 were not so pleasant in other respects as the eager young 
 student had anticipated. Rivalries which were often carried 
 to the pitch of bitter jealousies made the course of true art- 
 life run anything but smoothly at times, and the system 
 then in vogue, by which money and influence together 
 made a student's career one of pleasure or, by absence of 
 either, one of hardship, rendered comradeship by no means 
 so easy as it generally is wherever the bond of Art exists. 
 Severn does not seem to have made any friends among his 
 student acquaintances at this time, but rather to have 
 incurred some ill-feeling by his self-confidence, perhaps 
 self-assertiveness, and by his enthusiasm — then, as now, 
 and always, a quality unacceptable to the many. 
 
 In the fortunate years of youth even seemingly untoward 
 accidents as often as not induce new and welcome develop- 
 ments. Through having been nearly crushed to death at a 
 theatre Severn, as he declares, gained anew insight into Art. 
 Writing in 1857, he affirms he had been so many times 
 near_ death and in its actual presence that, though con- 
 stitutionally not of a courageous nature, he had gained a 
 coolness in the front of danger which would mislead many 
 people into thinking him possessed of no common valour. 
 Strangely enough, he was conscious of less fear, of a self- 
 possessed calm, whenever the peril of death was actually 
 imminent : the more remote the possible mischance the 
 more harassing and almost prostrating the effect forecast 
 by it. To some extent he attributed this idiosyncrasy to 
 the drowning accident alluded to above, but even more to 
 his narrow escape from death at the Haymarket . Theatre. 
 He had often heard of the superb acting of Mrs. Siddons, 
 
12 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEIiN. 
 
 but as she had retired from the stage he could not hope to- 
 see her once more enthral a metropolitan audience. On the 
 occasion, however, of her brother, Charles Kemble, requiring 
 aid, she generously came forward with an offer to im- 
 personate Queen Katherine in Henry the Eighth. The- 
 advertisement appeared in due time, and besides the irresis- 
 tible attraction of Mrs. Siddons's name, playgoers read 
 that John Kemble would appear in the part of Cardinal 
 Wolsey, Charles in that of Cromwell, Pope in that of King 
 Henry, Miss Foote as Ann Boleyn, and that even the 
 subordinate parts were to be filled by actors of assured 
 repute. The popular Miss Stephens, moreover, was to sing, 
 in Queen Katherine's dream, ' Angels ever bright and fair/ 
 and altogether it was calculated that the little theatre in 
 the Haymarket would be crowded to its utmost limits. 
 When Severn and a friend, William Haslam,* reached the 
 doors an hour before the time of opening, the crowd was 
 already large : ere long it became so great that the 
 Haymarket was almost blocked by it. The entrance to the 
 pit was through a small door and along a narrow passage-.. 
 In the struggle which ensued upon the opening of the 
 doors Severn was separated from his friend and soon after- 
 wards stumbled and fell, with the result that he was 
 speedily trampled into unconsciousness and, indeed, escaped 
 death by little short of a miracle. At last, as the crowd 
 thinned, some one noticed that an unfortunate was being 
 done to death, if not already dead, and gave the alarm.. 
 The unconscious body (" thin as a skeleton almost, to start 
 with, and now flattened out like a pancake ") was uplifted 
 and conveyed over the playgoers' heads to the front of the 
 pit, where there was less risk of suffocation. When it was- 
 found that the sufferer was not dead, but at the same time 
 that he could not " come to," several doctors and medical 
 students from various parts of the house volunteered their 
 
 * William Haslam, whose name is so familiar to all students of 
 Keats's life and work, will be referred to frequently further on. He 
 was about a year older than Keats, as he was born some time in 1795 
 He died in 1852. 
 
MBS. SIDDONS AS QUEEN KATEEBINE. 13 
 
 assistance, though for three-quarters of an hour the patient 
 remained insensible, and scarcely shewed signs of life. But 
 just before the performance began consciousness returned. 
 Although everything in his pockets was smashed (two 
 oranges, he says, were reduced to a kind of marmalade- 
 like pulp), and his clothes were so torn and soiled as to be 
 thenceforth useless, no bones were broken or any serious 
 damage incurred beyond a " universal bruise from head to 
 foot." Either he could not or would not be removed, and 
 when the curtain rose he was left in peace. He watched 
 the performance in a dazed fashion till Mrs. Siddons 
 appeared, when "her impressive demeanour and magical 
 dignity and pathos " so affected nerves already feverishly 
 excited that he sat as one entranced and conscious of some 
 new and vital influence in his life. Severn believed that 
 " something had been trampled out of him : " that there- 
 after he was " well in spirit." Probably his excitable nature 
 had been so wrought upon by the shock, by the physical 
 suffering, and by the sudden change from a long-continued 
 apathy to a state of comparative exhilaration, that he 
 became subject to a kind of happy frenzy. He never 
 forgot the performance nor its effect upon him. From 
 that day, when the power and magic of Art was borne 
 in upon him, he determined to live the life of an artist, 
 whatever the sacrifices involved, the cost to be paid. 
 In his eightieth year, even, he would recall with vivid 
 speech and gestures his emotions of that far-back night. 
 In all his life, though a frequenter of the theatre and 
 at one time passionately fond of it, he declared that he 
 never saw such acting: no man could expect to see 
 twice, he says, such a combination of the highest dramatic 
 genius and personal beauty, with such altogether admirable 
 helpmates.* 
 
 * It may be worth while to give part of Severn's recollections of the 
 great actress : for there must be few now living who once were moved to 
 deep emotion by the genius of Sarah Siddons. Her " farewell appearance " 
 was as Lady Macbeth, at Covent Garden, in June, 1812. But between the 
 summer of 1813 and that of 1819 she acted publicly again some six or 
 seven times, from motives of friendship or generosity. The performance at 
 
14 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Weak and in suffering though he was, and enthralled 
 too by the pageant upon which he looked, Severn was yet 
 able to make several drawings of Mrs. Siddons in her 
 most striking and characteristic attitudes. From these 
 
 which Severn was present took place on May 31st, 1816. " Her large and 
 imposing figure," he writes, " was well suited to the character and situation 
 of Queen Katherine in Henry the Vlllth. Her noble countenance not 
 only impressed all, but, despite her years, was winsome by those additional 
 marks of beauty such as only a good and dignified length of life can give. 
 Her brow was Juno-like, and when she uttered the words, ' Lord Cardinal, 
 to you I speak — 'tis you hath blown this coal betwixt my lord and me,' 
 her large black lustrous eyes flashed fire, and it was such an inspired 
 glance as I have never but that once seen. Then, after maintaining this 
 majestic front till she is about to leave the Court, when the crier calls out 
 ' Katherine, Queen of England, come into Court,' and her maid reminds 
 her that she is called back, when suddenly she descended from the 
 Queen to the woman, and showed her private anger in saying sotto voce to 
 her maid, ' Fool, why need you notice it ' — the change was wonderful. 
 Afterwards, in the dying scene, she was not less impressive, calm and 
 resigned, still beautiful though so different, altogether changed from what 
 she had been, save for that deep touching voice whose tones, whether loud 
 and impassioned or soft and pathetic, were like the finest music, for they 
 thrilled the air with melodious tones, and at the same time touched the 
 heart with such deep pathos that the audience seemed to think it a merit 
 to shed tears and thus appropriately accompany such sublime acting. One 
 seemed, indeed, to be an onlooker on the actual pageant of life rather than 
 auditor to an acted tale of history. The Cardinal was impersonated by 
 John Kemble, in all the pride of intellect, and beauty of person and 
 countenance, that so raised him above his fellows. The profound show of 
 humility he assumed at first in the trial scene, and thereafter his haughty 
 pride to the nobles when he suspects imminent danger, were masterly ; 
 but nothing could be more superb in acting than his discovery of the 
 wrong paper given him by the King, when he trembled from head, to foot, 
 with convulsed underlip, which quivered like a leaf as the paper dropped 
 from his nerveless grasp. The part of Cromwell was in its way not less 
 perfectly rendered by Charles Kemble, whose handsome face and youthful 
 figure made a good foil to the worn and o'er-ambitious Cardinal. And 
 how am I to describe the lovely Miss Poote asAnnBoleyn? — for she was a 
 paragon of beauty, which was set off rather than detracted from by the 
 unassuming nature of her acting. She was fair, and might well have been 
 the real Venus of the antique world, as Mrs. Siddons would then have as 
 certainly been the Juno. To complete the greatness and individual 
 splendour of this unique performance, Miss Stephens (whose voice and 
 simple style surpassed anything 1 have ever heard since, even in Italy) 
 sang 'Angels ever bright and fair' as though an angel had silently and 
 invisibly (for she was not seen) descended to console the dying Queen. 
 The pure voice and unaffected style made the illusion perfect — and the 
 dream itself, as represented so wonderfully by Charles Kean in 1855, with 
 the groups of angels bearing palms, and with rays of heavenly light, even 
 this, with all its magio, was not comparable in effect with the solitary 
 voice of Miss Stephens singing her sweet vibrating song. I have been 
 
FIRST STEPS TO SUCCESS. 15 
 
 studies he made other drawings, for which he found a 
 ready sale at the small sum he asked for each, and so 
 at last he found himself able to purchase an easel, oil- 
 paints, and other paraphernalia which till then he had 
 lacked. 
 
 thus particular in recording this unique dramatic representation, as, apart 
 from its influence on me, perhaps none so perfect may ever be seen again ; 
 moreover, the record will tend to prove how strong my mind and feeling 
 must havo been for such triumphs of (he imagination and the moving 
 spirit of history that, almost in the grasp of death (for nearer death I 
 suppose I at no time ever was), my spirit was not only unquenched but 
 rarely exalted." 
 
1G LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 First meeting with Keats — Letter from George Keats — Keats's appear- 
 ance — Country walks with Keats — His first picture — Arduous 
 studies — 'The Cave of Despair' — Letters from Keats — Severn gains 
 the Gold Medal — Keats-reminiscences — Keats and the Elgin 
 Marbles — Hay don's famous dinner-party — Earliest version of Keats's 
 'Pingal's Cave' — Death of Tom Keats — Miss Fanny Brawne — The 
 Ode to a Nightingale — Keats's first collapse — Severn and Hyperion 
 and Lamia — Keats's decision to go to Italy, 
 
 Severn was still an engraver's apprentice and casual 
 student at the Academy schools when he formed an ac- 
 quaintanceship which rapidly developed into friendship, 
 and became ultimately the chief factor from without in his 
 life. Every incident of his friendly relationship with Keats 
 is of interest, for surely there is nothing in the history of 
 art and letters more deeply affecting than the story of the 
 untimely death of one of the greatest of English poets, and 
 the self-sacrificing loyalty and love of the young painter 
 whose name is for ever indissociable from that of his illus- 
 trious friend. 
 
 There is some uncertainty as to the date when Keats and 
 Severn first met. The latter wrote once that the event 
 occurred so early as 1813, but as he added that Keats was 
 then " walking Guy's Hospital," it is clear that he was 
 mistaken, for the poet had not then begun his hospital 
 experiences. On the other hand, there is some likelihood 
 that he met Keats either when the latter was staying at 
 8, Dean Street, in the Borough, or in St. Thomas's Street ; 
 and there seems no doubt that his introduction by William 
 Haslam certainly was not later than the spring of 1816, 
 just before Keats went to reside with his brothers in 
 lodgings in the Poultry. It has been commonly asserted 
 that the meeting occurred in 1817, and that the introducer 
 was either Haslam, Holmes, or Haydon; but it is un- 
 
FIRST MEETING WITH KEATS. 17 
 
 questionable that Keats and Severn had met by the 
 autumn of 1816 at latest, though probably in the spring of 
 that year, if not, as I am inclined to believe, earlier.* 
 Keats, despite his genial manner, was apt to be reticent 
 with new acquaintances, and it is possible that when he 
 first met Joseph Severn he was not sufficiently impressed to 
 seek familiarity of intercourse ; while Severn, on his part, 
 though he has stated several times how immediate and 
 irresistible was the spell cast over him by the poet, may 
 not have felt entitled to demand the privileges of friend- 
 ship, particularly as he had then so little leisure, and, 
 moreover, no lodgings to which he cared to invite a friend. 
 In the MS. sketch entitled ' My Tedious Life,' Severn 
 does explicitly state that the event happened in 1817, 
 adding, " we soon became the greatest friends ; " but the 
 genial artist's dates are at all times untrustworthy, and with 
 one who used words so loosely, "soon" might indicate a 
 few months as well as a few weeks, or even a year or so. 
 From various vague statements in the MSS. it would 
 appear that lengthy intervals occurred between the 
 meetings of the friends during the first part of their 
 acquaintanceship, and even when there was no longer 
 any reserve betwixt them, but genuine affection and sym- 
 pathy. Keats had many friends, Severn few, and, more- 
 over, little leisure. Yet Severn seems to have resented 
 any lengthy interval in seeing John, or for that matter 
 George Keats, with whom he had also formed a firm 
 friendship. There must, in all likelihood, have been an 
 intimacy of some standing before George Keats would 
 write as follows : — 
 
 ffampstead, 
 
 " Wednesday Evening, 
 "My deab Fellow, 
 
 " What a most unconscionable fellow you must be for fearing my brother 
 has forgotten you without knowing the ' how ' — and the ' why.' Take 
 
 * In a letter to Charles Cowden Clarke, of 17th December, 1816, Keats 
 alludes to Reynolds having promised to be with him that evening, and 
 adds : " Yesterday I had the same promise from Severn. ..." 
 
 C 
 
18 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 my assurance that he has not ; that he has heard where your Picture is 
 situate, and notwithstanding that disadvantage looks so well and attracts 
 so much attention, pleases Haydon, and moreover, that a very clerkly 
 written review of it hag appeared in an esteemed magazine, and what the 
 praise thus bestowed amounts to — all this he has heard within this week. 
 Can he, then, have forgotten the complaining Severn? Be like that 
 Eiver 
 
 ' That makes sweet music with enamell'd stones, 
 
 Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge 
 
 He overtaketh in his pilgrimage ; 
 
 And so by many winding nooks he strays, 
 
 With willing sport, to the wild ocean.' 
 
 " He shall know your feelings about the treatment of your picture, but I 
 think he'll agree with me iu thinking that all those who are likely to have 
 tastes to boast of, will be pretty well acquainted with the delightful 
 passage the directors of the exhibition have thought proper to omit. Who 
 does not know one of the best jewels, set in the midst of the richest gems, 
 that ever proceeded from the Brain of Man ? The Midsummer Night's 
 Dream is the masterpiece of fanciful Poetry — no exceptions — oh, yes, The 
 Tempest, one ! I have read them both since I have been here, all in 
 green Fields, under green Hedges, and upon green Mounts, surrounded by 
 nature in her prettiest dress, decked in the flowers of Spring. One may 
 say with truth that Shakespeare carries you where he pleases, but the 
 •quicker the senses the more he is enjoyed — and how the free air of the 
 .hills quickens the Brain, I can witness. I did not know our grand, 
 awful Bard till now, but now he comes upon me with all his light, 
 
 darkening the name of every other votary in proportion ( might be 
 
 " The " with an omitted word, or perhaps " Jno ") is not just — I am taken 
 by surprise — 'tis true ! I could go on a great deal more of this sort — but 
 ' methinks I prattle something too wildly ' — what profanation to place 
 such a line here ; I deserve to be pilloried for it. Whatever may be the 
 merits of this case about your picture, you may depend on victory, since 
 Shakespeare will be sure to side with one who so well illustrates the 
 pictures of his imagination. 'Twas my intention to have made you a 
 visit on Monday when I was in town, but the villainous rain (I cannot 
 say refreshing rain) kept me away ; as it was, I was soaked, and obliged 
 to walk to Hampstead through it. Since then I have passed my 
 threshold only once. To-morrow I shall be in town, but business of 
 importance calls me another way than your house. If you should be 
 inclined to spend a day in the Country, and have a look at the beautiful 
 scenery of this place, please send a note mentioning the day, and I will be 
 careful to be in the way. I would offer you a bed, were that possible ; 
 that it is not is a cause of regret to 
 
 " Your friend, 
 
 " Geobge Keats. 
 
 " Observe. — Let me know at least two days before you come, unless 
 
KEATS' S APPEARANCE. 19 
 
 you choose to run the risque of my being from home, which I would not 
 have. — G. K. John and Tom are at Canterbury — (no time for more)." 
 
 Intimacy, at any rate, did not begin till 1816, or possibly 
 early in 1817. Tbere is, at least, no question as to the 
 profound impression made upon Severn by Keats. It was 
 bis good fortune to encounter in bis youth, he says, one of 
 those incidents which change or make the whole course of a 
 man's life. 
 
 " This was the congenial meeting with a young poet near my own age,* 
 and so gifted with a bright imagination and with such charming manners, 
 and with great communicativeness,! that I felt raised to the third 
 heaven. Fortunately for me we soon became the greatest friends, for 
 there was much in common between us in addition to a mutual love of 
 nature." [This common love was in itself sufficient to form the basis of 
 friendship, and later, if not at first, the two young men often went long 
 walks together beyond Highgate Woods or across the Hampstead Weald. 
 Their friendship was further based on an unequal reciprocity, he adds in 
 effect :] " on my part, in the reception of such intellectual largesse with a 
 warm feeling of gratitude, and on his part, the freedom of generous 
 bestowal of his mental richness, and the free imparting of his poetical 
 gifts, as well as his taste in the arts, his knowledge of history, and his 
 most fascinating power in the communication of these. Thus a new 
 world was opened to me, and I was raised from the mechanical drudgery 
 of my art to the hope of brighter and more elevated courses." 
 
 What most impressed Severn was his new friend's 
 singular compactness ; " just as bis mind was atune with 
 the divine harmony," be wrote to a friend, "so be was 
 in his bodily self a melody of humanity." Though 
 small of stature, " not more than three-quarters of an inch 
 over five feet," he seemed taller, partly from the perfect 
 symmetry of his frame, partly from his erect attitude and a 
 characteristic backward poise (sometimes a toss) of the 
 bead, and, perhaps more than anything else, from a 
 
 * Severn was the elder by two years. Keats was born in 1795. 
 
 f This seems contradictory to what is said above, but Keats was often 
 frankly communicative with new acquaintances, though in intimacy 
 subject to moods of almost austere reticence. The circumstance of 
 Severn's allusion to his " communicativeness " as one of his immediately 
 obvious traits goes to decide the question as to the date of their first 
 meeting. 
 
 C 2 
 
20 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 peculiarly dauntless expression, such as may be seen on the 
 face of some seamen. Severn noticed too, even then, the 
 almost namelike intensity of Keats's eager glances when he 
 was keenly excited or interested ; " they were like the 
 hazel eyes of a wild gipsy-maid in colour," he said once r 
 " set in the face of a young god." The only time Keats- 
 appeared to him as small of stature was when he was 
 reading, or when he was walking rapt in some deep reverie ; 
 when the chest fell in, the head bent forward as though 
 weightily overburdened, and the eyes seemed almost to 
 throw a light before his face. In some of the walks they 
 took together Severn was astonished by his companion's 
 faculty of observation. Nothing seemed to escape him, the 
 song of a bird and the undernote of response from covert or 
 hedge, the rustle of some animal, the changing of the 
 green and brown lights and furtive shadows, the motions of 
 the wind — just how it took certain tall flowers and plants- 
 — and the wayfaring of the clouds : even the features and 
 gestures of passing tramps, the colour of one woman's hair,, 
 the smile on one child's face, the furtive animalism below 
 the deceptive humanity in many of the vagrants, even 
 the hats, clothes, shoes, wherever these conveyed the 
 remotest hint as to the real self of the wearer. Withal, 
 even when in a mood of joyous observance, with flow 
 of happy spirits, he would suddenly become taciturn, not 
 because he was tired, not even because his mind was- 
 suddenly wrought to some bewitching vision, but from 
 a profound disquiet which he could not or would not^ 
 explain. Certain things affected him extremely, parti- 
 cularly when "a wave was billowing through a tree," 
 as he described the uplifting surge of air among- 
 swaying masses of chestnut or oak foliage, or when,, 
 afar off,, he heard the wind coming across woodlands. 
 " The tide ! the tide ! " he would cry delightedly, and 
 spring on to some stile, or upon the low bough of a wayside 
 tree, and watch the passage of the wind upon the meadow- 
 grasses or young corn, not stirring till the flow of air was all 
 around him, while an expression of rapture made his eyes- 
 
VOUNTRY WALKS WITH KEATS. 21 
 
 .gleam and. his face glow till lie " would look sometimes like 
 •a wild fawn waiting for some cry from the forest-depths," or 
 like " a young eagle staring with proud joy " before taking 
 flight. This " eagle " appearance of Keats at certain times 
 much impressed Severn. "He was a nightingale only 
 •when he sang," he remarked to a friend once; "at other 
 times he was a wild hawk." " I can never forget the wine- 
 like lustre of Keats's eyes," he said, on another occasion, 
 ■"just like those of certain birds which habitually front the 
 sun." " Those falcon-eyes," as he wrote in his account of 
 the poet's last desperate days. 
 
 The only thing that would bring Keats out of one of his 
 fits of seeming gloomful reverie — when he would answer 
 with cold, almost harsh brevity, or not at all, although his 
 eyes would have no hardness, but appeared larger than 
 usual and as though veiled in profound shadows : so darkly 
 pathetic, as Severn thought long afterward, though he did 
 not specially note this at the time, that the poet might 
 have been a woman consumed by some secret and fatal 
 anguish, rather than the bright, joyous, and genial, even 
 jovial, Keats — the only thing, during those country-rambles, 
 that would bring the poet "to himself again" was the 
 motion " of the inland sea " he loved so well, particularly 
 the violent passage of wind across a great field of barley. 
 From fields of oats or barley, Severn declared once, it was 
 .almost impossible to allure him ; he would stand, leaning 
 forward, listening intently, watching with a bright serene 
 look in his eyes and sometimes with a slight smile, the 
 tumultuous passage of the wind above the grain. The sea, 
 or thought-compelling images of the sea, always seemed to 
 restore him to a happy calm. Naturally these were 
 memorable walks for the impressionable young painter, 
 who from the first was conscious that he. was enjoying the 
 ■companionship of a master-spirit. 
 
 But ere the acquaintanceship had grown into intimacy, 
 And while Severn saw rather more of George Keats than 
 of his elder brother, he was preparing for an ambitious 
 encounter with fate. The picture alluded to in George 
 
22 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Keats's letter, 'Hermia and Helena,' brought neither 
 profit, direct or indirect, nor praise from those quarters 
 where the artist most eagerly wished it to come : and for a 
 time Severn was almost in despair. But gradually he 
 discovered that he was making way in the " Antique " class 
 at the Academy, and that not only his fellow students but 
 one or two artists of high standing, including Fuseli (then 
 Keeper), were attracted by his rapid progress. He grudged 
 neither time nor labour in the effort to approach mastery in 
 draughtsmanship. Thus, in his determination to succeed 
 in a perfect drawing of the Laocoon group he strove (after 
 his day's employment under Mr. Bond, his couple of hours' 
 careful drawing at the " Antique " class, and his long walk 
 out to his father's house in Hoxton) for two hours each 
 evening throughout a whole winter. During the evenings 
 of the ensuing summer he worked away at a drawing of 
 two Gladiators fighting, and felt no small encouragement 
 when Fuseli complimented him upon his success and 
 began to take a genuine interest in him. One day 
 Severn read an announcement about the Grand Prize in 
 Historical Painting. His - heart beat with excitement as 
 the idea flashed across his mind to try to win, or at least 
 make a creditable struggle for it, notwithstanding his 
 inexperience in painting in oils ; though his courage sank 
 almost to vanishing-point when he read further that the 
 prize had not been awarded for twelve years, as no com-* 
 petitor had proved himself sufficiently worthy to carry it 
 off. He had need to remember all the encouragement he 
 had received at the " School " of late, even in the life-class ; 
 where, he records, he was first set to draw the feet of 
 Hercules, from a model, and found himself companioned 
 by a young artist afterwards to become famous as Sir 
 Edwin Landseer. Yet even then he hardly dared to 
 regard himself as worthy to be a candidate for a prize, 
 the winning of which would mean more than customary 
 repute. The subject, however, allured him. Keats had 
 spoken to him enthusiastically about Spenser, and had read 
 and recited passages of The Fairie Queene till Severn had 
 
' THE CA VE OF DESPAIR.' '23: 
 
 been fired to an ardour which would not rest content with- 
 out possession of the precious volume. He had come to love 
 the poem almost as much as did the young poet, though 
 naturally enough it did not give him the same ecstatic 
 pleasure in its subtle under-music and quaint, picturesque, 
 vivid, happy epithets. Thus it was that, when he read_in 
 the announcement that the motive for the prize-picture 
 was to be found in Spenser's lines descriptive of the seizure 
 by Una of the dagger from the despairful Eed Cross knight, 
 he felt as though the scene were in a sense familiar to him. 
 "When, later, he told Keats the subject of his picture, the 
 poet smiled with pleasure, and at once repeated the lines of 
 the fifty-second stanza. 
 
 " Which whenas Una saw, through every vaine 
 The cradled cold ran to her well of life, 
 As in a swowne ; but, soone reliv'd againe, 
 Out of his hand she snacht the cursed kuife, 
 And threw it to the ground, enraged rife, 
 And to bim said ; ' Fie, fie, faint-hearted Knight ! 
 What meanest thou by this reproachful strife ? 
 Is this the battaile which thou vaunt'st to fight 
 With that fire-mouthed Dragon horrible and bright?" 
 
 — (The Fairie Queene, Bfe. I., Canto x.) 
 
 So much for the subject. As to the size of the canvas, 
 Severn saw to his relief that it was to be an ordinary half- 
 length, that is 4 ft. 2 in. by 3 ft. 4 in. There was a year's 
 time before him in which to work at it, and he began forth- 
 with to think over the subject, make studies for the four 
 figures, and accustom himself to painting in oils. It was 
 to this end that he also ambitiously began another picture, 
 that alluded to in George Keats's already quoted letter. It 
 was this Shakesperian picture which was his first attempt 
 in oils, and not, as sometimes stated, the prize-painting of 
 ' The Cave of Despair.' The subject was a figure-study of 
 Hermia and Helena in A Midsummer Night's Bream, which 
 Severn had been reading at the instigation of Keats. 
 
 Having quite, or nearly, completed ' Hermia and Helena,' 
 Severn set himself in earnest to attempt 'The Cave of 
 
24 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Despair' — a title, he says, which was only too painfully 
 significant of his state of mind. The picture was in part 
 painted in the winter, in a cold room without a fire and with 
 insufficient light. The progress made was slight, partly 
 because the artist persevered in secrecy concerning his under- 
 taking, and mainly from the circumstance of his inability to 
 devote to it more than the brief leisure when he was not 
 occupied with the painting of his miniatures. With these 
 small portraits he had gained some success. Miniatures 
 were frequently commissioned, and though his prices 
 ranged only from half-a-guinea to three guineas — more 
 often the smaller sum — yet he was fortunate in , having 
 found even this demand for his artistic work. So well, in- 
 deed, was he progressing that if he had not resolved to do 
 something in oil-painting he would probably have become 
 a professional painter of miniatures in water-colours. Not- 
 withstanding his industry in this direction, however, he 
 found it difficult to obtain what he most needed. When the 
 cold weather set in he had to paint, as already stated, 
 without a fire — except, he adds, that supplied by his own 
 enthusiasm. In two of his ' Eeminiscences ' he alludes to 
 the fact of his having painted the limbs of the figure of 
 Despair from his own naked shivering legs, as seen in a 
 looking-glass in the chill morning or afternoon light. Often 
 he thought of giving up the task as one beyond his means ; 
 but as time advanced he became more and more determined 
 to go on with his attempt. Ere long the painting of the 
 picture had become a kind of passion with him. With 
 ever fresh hope and determination he devoted all his spare 
 time to it, and finally sold his few treasured possessions, 
 including his watch and his books, so that he might not 
 lack the materials he required.* 
 
 * That there were bright episodes as well is evident from a passage in 
 a letter of Keats to his brothers, dated from Featherstone Buildings, on 
 the 5th of January, 1818. At that time Charles Wells, author of 
 'Joseph and his Brethren,' &c., lived in Featherstone Buildings, and 
 Keats saw much of him. " Wells and Severn dined with me yesterday. 
 We had a yery pleasant day .... we enjoyed ourselves very much; 
 were all very witty and full of Rhymes. We played a concert from four 
 
LETTER FROM KEATS. 25 
 
 In course of time the canvas was duly despatched to the 
 Koyal Academy, and Severn's mind relaxed to " a certain 
 despairful ease." About the end of October he received 
 the following letter from Keats : — 
 
 " Wentwortli Place, 
 " Wednesday [October 27th ? 1819.] 
 " Dear Severn, 
 
 " Either your joke about staying at home is a very old one or I 
 really call'd. I don't remember doing so. I am glad to hear you have 
 finish'd the Picture, and am more anxious to see it than I have time to 
 spare ; for I have been so very lax, unemployed, unmeridian'd, and object- 
 less these two months that I even grudge indulging (and that is no great 
 indulgence considering the Lecture is not over till 9, and the lecture 
 room seven miles from Wentworth Place) myself by going to Hazlitt's 
 Lecture. If you have hours to the amount of a brace of dozens to throw 
 away you may sleep nine of them here in your little crib and chat the rest. 
 When your Picture is up and in a good light I shall make a point of 
 meeting you at the Academy if you will let me know when. If you 
 should be at the Lecture to-morrow evening I shall see you — and con- 
 gratulate you heartily — Haslam I know is very Beadle to an amorous 
 sigh. 
 
 " Tour sincere friend, 
 
 " John Keats." 
 
 Severn was glad that he had worked so hard, and, though 
 •conscious of the fact that he had gained some valuable 
 artistic knowledge during its composition, yet his ambitious 
 deed now seemed to him little short of preposterous. Yet 
 he knew that his hazard was to prove the turning-point in 
 his Art life, whatever its result. 
 
 The early winter-weeks passed without any news, though 
 Severn attended the students' class at the Academy every 
 evening ; but about the beginning of December a rumour 
 spread that the Council had decided to award a Gold 
 Medal, though none had been given for twelve years, not- 
 withstanding the fact that among the competitors had been 
 several sons of Academicians. 
 
 o'clock till ten .... Severn tells me he has an order for some drawings 
 for the Emperor of Russia." There is no other record of his serious illness 
 in the autumn of 1818 than the allusion in a letter of Keats to his 
 brother George and his sister-in-law, written in mid-October. " Severn 
 has had a narrow escape of his life from a Typhus fever : he is now 
 gaining strength." 
 
26 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 The name of each competing student was in turn bruited 
 about as that of the favoured individual, and Severn had the 
 doubtful pleasure of hearing his picture alluded to as " the 
 dark horse that might win" — doubtful, because he had 
 always the mortification of hearing the suggestion scouted, 
 and, indeed, of believing that it was a mere play of guess- 
 work and that he had no chance. Still, the praise he 
 obtained from one or two friends gave him encouragement, 
 and though he could not persuade his angry and sorrowing 
 father, or surly Mr. Bond, to go and see the picture where it 
 hung, he had the pleasure of inducing Keats, among others,, 
 to inspect it. 
 
 In answer to Severn's letter of the 4th December, Keats- 
 replied two days later as follows : — 
 
 " Wentworth Place {Hampstead], 
 " Monday Morn. 
 " My deak Severn, 
 
 " I am very sorry that on Tuesday I have an appointment in the 
 City of an undeferrable nature ; and Brown * on the same day has some 
 business at Guildhall. I have not been able to figure your manner of 
 executing the Cave of Despair, therefore it will be at any rate a novelty 
 and surprise to me — I trust on the right side. I shall call upon you some 
 morning shortly early enough to catch you before you can get out — when 
 we will proceed to the Academy. I think you must be suited with a 
 good painting light in your bay window. I wish you to return the com- 
 pliment by going with me to see a Poem I have hung up for the Prize in 
 the Lecture Boom of the Surrey Institution. I have many rivals ; the 
 most threatening are ' An Ode to Lord Castlereagh,' and a new series ojf 
 Hymns for the New, New Jerusalem Chapel. You had best put me into 
 your Cave of Despair. 
 
 " Ever yours sincerely, 
 
 " John Keats." 
 
 Keats was delighted with his friend's picture, though he 
 had himself conceived a very different setting for the 
 episode ; and he even ventured to prophesy that if the 
 work did not gain the medal it would be the most honour- 
 able of the failures. Personally, he liked it the best of the 
 several competitive canvases. Though, as he protested, he 
 
 * Charles Armitage Brown, Afterwards (and till his death in 1842) the 
 most intimate friend of Severn as well as of Keats. 
 
SEVERN GAINS THE GOLD MEDAL. 27 
 
 was no judge in the technical merits of painting, Keats had 
 so quick a sympathy with, and so sure an insight into Art, 
 that Severn felt greatly encouraged. 
 
 The 10th of December was the elate when the name of 
 the successful competitor was to be published. Already 
 there had been jealous whisperings to the effect that Joseph 
 Severn, the miniature-painter, was, for all his inexperience, 
 to be the fortunate man ; but even when he overheard 
 the rumour he could not realise the chance as anything 
 more than a vague possibility. The ceremony was to 
 be held in the Council Eoom, which had been specially 
 prepared for the occasion, and all the students were invited. 
 " The solemnity was increased," adds Severn, " by the 
 ceremony taking place in the evening after eight o'clock." 
 
 Prizes were to be given to three students, it was announced, 
 and the Gold Medal for painting, so long unawarded, was 
 to be bestowed upon a young candidate whose efforts were 
 all the more praiseworthy in that he was entirely self-taught. 
 After this preliminary announcement there ensued a few 
 moments' strained silence. Then, to the bewilderment of 
 the successful student, and perhaps to the surprise of most 
 present, the President mentioned Joseph Severn as the 
 Gold Medallist. 
 
 As soon as the Gold Medal was placed in the successful 
 competitor's hands, and he could get away, Severn made 
 haste to carry home the news. He writes that when he 
 reached home his father had gone to bed in despair at his 
 son's inveterate folly. He ran up to his room, and with a 
 few eager words told his good fortune. His father looked 
 incredulous, and inclined to be angry at what he resented 
 as worse than levity ; but " the sight of the large Gold 
 Medal weighing some half a pound instantly enabled him 
 to believe, and see the truth that I could be an artist 
 without ' apprenticeship to the business.' " 
 
 Severn was delighted with his success, but, some fifteen 
 years later, in a fragmentary chapter of autobiography, he 
 wrote : " For the first time there seemed a chance for me, 
 but only seemed ; for the solid pudding never showed, and 
 
28 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 all I got was such an amount of ugly envy that I was 
 obliged to forsake the Royal Academy." 
 
 So there was nothing for it but miniature-painting once 
 more, and the familiar difficulties and worries. It was at 
 this time that Keats's friendship meant much to him. The 
 two young men saw each other frequently, Keats often 
 journeying to London expressly to see Severn and to go 
 with him to the National Gallery, the Sculpture galleries 
 of the British Museum, and elsewhere. Severn, also, often 
 made his way to Hampstead, generally for an afternoon 
 walk, though occasionally he stayed overnight with a friend 
 who lived in the neighbourhood. On these occasions he 
 met Leigh Hunt, Haydon, Eeynolds, Haslam, Charles 
 Brown, and several others, though he seems to have formed 
 intimate friendship with Brown and George Keats only. 
 Haslam, as we have seen, he already knew and greatly liked. 
 
 Early in 1819, after he had been " driven away from the 
 Academy," he gave up his lodging in Goswell Street, and 
 went to reside again at his father's house in Hoxton. 
 Thence it was easy for him to reach Hampstead, and, as a 
 matter of fact, he declares that he had almost daily inter- 
 course with Keats. So interested was the latter in every t 
 thing concerning Art that he was always glad to learn 
 anything he could about the technique of painting ; and 
 his friend tells how their frequent communion was really 
 mutual instruction. The poet learned much about certain 
 mysteries of line and colour, and it was through those 
 lessons that he came to see how greatly his much-admired 
 friend Haydon had over-estimated his powers. One great 
 debt, on the other hand, the older owed to the younger. He 
 was almost wholly ignorant of the charm and beauty of the 
 old Greek myths, of ancient classic literature and art ; yet 
 from no scholar, in the common sense of the term, could he 
 «have learned so much. 
 
 Keats, therefore, was to Severn as a young Moses, dis- 
 closing a golden land of promise. The world had a new 
 meaning for him ; no doubt he often saw the familiar 
 Hampstead Heath through the same glamour as it was 
 
KEATS-REMINISCENCES. 29- 
 
 viewed by his friend. He was proud of having taken 
 Keats to see the Elgin marbles and of having pointed out 
 their beauty, but he had not really understood them aright 
 till his novice had enabled him to see with a new and 
 happier vision. It was not till after the poet's death, 
 however, and when Severn was alone in Home and with the 
 sense that it was to be his home, that he realised how deep 
 was his indebtedness. " Koine," he says, " the real Eome 
 would never have become a joy to me— not, at any rate, for 
 a very long time, and even then with difficulty and at best 
 obscurely — had it not been for Keats's talks with me about 
 the Greek spirit, — the Eeligion of the Beautiful, the Keli- 
 gion of Joy, as he used to call it. All that was finest in 
 sculpture — and, as I came to see directly or indirectly, all 
 that was finest too in painting, in everything — was due to 
 that supreme influence. ' I never cease to wonder at all 
 that incarnate Delight,' Keats remarked to me once : nor 
 do I either, now that in inferior measure I too see something 
 of what he saw." 
 
 " Keats," he remarked once to a friend, " made me in love 
 with the real living Spirit of the past. He was the first to 
 point out to me how essentially modern that Spirit is : ' It's 
 an immortal youth,' he would say, ' just as there is no Now 
 or Then for the Holy Ghost.' " 
 
 It was a time of earnest effort and keen living for both 
 young men, and Severn was ever wont to recall with lingering- 
 memory the days when he and Keats were " in almost daily 
 intercourse." 
 
 From the moment of their first meeting, the elder had 
 been deeply impressed by the genius of the younger. 
 Writing of this some five-and-fifty years later he alludes to 
 his newly-won friend's " poetical gifts, his taste in the Arts, 
 his knowledge of history, his most fascinating power of 
 communicating all these. Thus a new world was opened to 
 me, and I was raised from the mechanical drudgery of my 
 Art to the hope of brighter and more elevated courses." 
 " The first example for me of his magic power," he adds,. 
 " was the ' Sonnet on First Heading Chapman's Homer.'' " 
 
30 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 " I confess that at the moment he recited it to me I also felt like Cortez 
 when he stared at the Pacific with a wild surmise, for the young poet in 
 me realised the truth and beauty of Ms words. My astonishment was all 
 the greater, as I did not know of any young poet who had called up such 
 spirit of completeness in his first attempt. I knew the first works of Burns 
 and of Byron, and they could not compare with these first attempts of my 
 friend. Even Chatterton seemed to me inferior in the poetical fire which 
 characterised John Keats." 
 
 The circle of friends to which he was introduced was one 
 very different from that to which he was accustomed at 
 home. Whenever Keats was away from Hampstead, how- 
 ever, Severn either ceased to care to go thither or fancied 
 that his visits would be unwelcome, for at that time he was 
 keenly alive to his half real, half supersensitively imagined 
 intellectual shortcomings, and apt to apprehend boredom on 
 account of his company when none existed. Occasionally 
 he wrote to George Keats to this effect, but that plain- 
 spoken individual would promptly reply as follows ; for 
 
 example : — 
 
 " Hampstead, 
 
 " Tuesday. 
 " My dear Sib, 
 
 " Have the goodness never to complain again about being forgotten. 
 How many invitations have you received from me ? How many have you 
 answered? To the former question maybe answered 'a dozen'; to the 
 latter, ' not one ' ! Has Sampson done more execution than the Jews ever 
 wished, or Joseph Severn intended ? ... If you are completely disabled 
 I can do no other than pardon you ; but, on the contrary, if you have two 
 fingers left on your right hand, throw pardon to curs. You shall be 
 executed, tortured until your hair turn grey, or I'll pray the fates to direct 
 a thunder-bolt through the broken roof of your Philistine temple, making 
 the destruction of your canvas more dreadful than was the actual event. 
 Unless you behave better I'll do such deeds, what they are I know not, — 
 
 * I'll shoe a troop of horse with felt,' and . John will be in town 
 
 again soon. When he is, I will let you know and repeat my invitation. 
 He sojourns at present at Bo Peep, near Hastings. Tom's remembrances, 
 and my best wishes. 
 
 " Your friend, 
 
 " George Keats." 
 
 But before the intimacy became " almost daily," Keats and 
 Severn had many occasions for seeing much of each other : 
 even in London. In the early winter of 1817, Keats, to 
 oblige Eeynolds, agreed to act as theatrical critic on the 
 
EEATS-SEMINISCENCES. 31 
 
 staff of a paper called The Champion, and as the work was 
 not of an exigent order he had ample time to spend in the 
 company of friends. Late one evening (in January, 1818) 
 " he 'burst into my lodging, when I was toiling late at my 
 miniature-painting," and with eager elation described 
 a supper-party, of which an hour or two earlier he had been 
 one. When on a former occasion he had met Words- 
 worth he had been somewhat chilled by the great man's 
 reception of him, and by his sole comment on his 
 Hymn to Pan (from ' Endymion '), — " a pretty piece of 
 Paganism." He was, therefore, as much surprised as 
 delighted when Wordsworth called and invited him to 
 supper. When he reached his host's lodging he found one 
 or two other friends there, and altogether spent a memorable 
 evening. Haydon has left a vivid account of the supper- 
 party at his own house, the " immortal dinner," as he calls 
 it, when the two poets first met : but he seems to have 
 enjoyed it more than the youngest of his guests, who found 
 Words worth serenely frigid, and Charles Lamb " on the 
 down-hill side of tipsydom." Haydon, the irrepressible, 
 at least had the faculty of seeing his friends, as well as his 
 own achievements, in an ideal light ; and he was generous 
 enough to believe that the almost unknown young poet was 
 one of the most remarkable of his guests. " Wordsworth's 
 fine intonation, as he quoted Milton and Virgil, Keats's 
 eager inspired look, Lamb's quaint sparkle of latent humour, 
 so speeded the stream of conversation," he declares, that he 
 never spent a more delightful time. 
 
 Among the transcripts which Severn made of his friend's 
 early poems was one of a newly-written sonnet which Keats 
 read to him one January evening, beginning " Golden- 
 tongued Romance with serene lute." He had copied it, from 
 a letter to his brothers, then in Devonshire, for John Hamilton 
 Reynolds. Of all his friends, Keats at this time seemed to 
 delight most in the companionship of Reynolds : there- 
 after, perhaps, of Severn, whom once he assured laughingly 
 that he was " the most astonishingly suggestive innocent " 
 he had ever met. Severn's love of Art, musical taste, and 
 
32 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 genuine if haphazard appreciation of the beautiful in lite- 
 rature had no slight influence in the moulding of his friend's 
 poetic nature : for even in his own sphere of poetry Keats 
 occasionally learned from his pupil, as when the urgent 
 suasion of the latter led him to the study of ' Paradise Lost,' 
 which hitherto he had neglected or glanced at with indif- 
 ference. Keats, on the other hand, every time he went with 
 Severn to the Sculpture Galleries, or to Picture Exhi- 
 bitions, learned something or gained some suggestive hint. 
 One day, early in their friendship, for example, the young 
 artist waxed so enthusiastic about Titian's ( Bacchus ' that 
 a visit was specially made to the National Gallery. Keats, 
 was deeply impressed, and soon after read to his friend the 
 now famous description of Bacchus and his crew in ' Endy- 
 mion.' He went again and again to see the Elgin marbles,, 
 and would sit for an hour or more at a time beside 
 them rapt in revery. On one such occasion Severn came 
 upon the young poet, with eyes shining so brightly and 
 face so lit up by some visionary rapture, that he stole 
 quietly away without intrusion: less considerate than the 
 foppish acquaintance who, Keats told Severn, joined him one 
 afternoon in front of the marbles, viewed them condescend- 
 ingly through an eye-glass, and, having obtruded his com- 
 pany and his vapid remarks for an unwelcome length of 
 time, ended by saying, "Yes, I believe, Mr. Keats, we 
 may admire these works safely." 
 
 Keats did not long occupy his post of deputy dramatic- 
 critic, and before the first February spring-days had come 
 was back at his lodgings in Hampstead. " It was a delight 
 to me," says Severn, " to stroll over to "Well Walk across- 
 the fields from smoky London, to enjoy and profit by the 
 brightness of his genius — the more so as he received me 
 invariably with cordiality, and always found a way of appa- 
 rently making me equal to himself." Severn frequently 
 took his miniatures to finish at Hampstead, nominally so as 
 to get backgrounds for them, but really for the pleasure of 
 his friend's company. "They were my excuse," he adds,. 
 " for obtruding my miniature self on his superior society." 
 
HA YD ON' S FAMOUS DINNER-PARTY. 33 
 
 In the same set of reminiscences he tells how he first met 
 Wordsworth : and as this was the famous occasion on which 
 the author of ' The Excursion ' damped the ardour of his 
 youngest rival by his indifferent praise, the record may be 
 given in the writer's own words : — 
 
 " On these occasions Keats introduced me to many of his friends, mostly 
 literary men, with the exception of Haydon, the historical painter, who, at 
 the same time his work interested me, almost frightened me hy his exces- 
 sive vanity and presumption. It was in his house that, in the company of 
 Keats, I first met the famous poet Wordsworth ; when, also, were present 
 Leigh Hunt and Reynolds. The burden of conversation was the fashion" 
 of a vegetable diet, which was then being pursued by many, led on by the 
 poet Shelley — enthusiasts who had persevered for some time, to the injury 
 of their constitutions and the artistic appearance of their countenances. 
 Leigh Hunt most eloquently discussed the charms and advantages of these 
 vegetable banquets, depicting in glowing words the cauliflowers swimming 
 in melted butter, and the peas and beans never profaned with animal gravy. 
 In the midst of his rhapsody he was interrupted by the venerable Words- 
 worth, who begged permission to ask a question. ' If,' he said, ' by chauci. 
 of good luck they ever met with a caterpillar, they thanked their stars for 
 the delicious morsel of animal food.' [Haydon, it appears, was for a time i 
 vegetarian in practice, and almost a fanatic in his advocacy of the good 
 cause.] " This absurdity," Severn resumes, " all came to an end by an ugly 
 discovery. Haydon, whose ruddy face had kept the other enthusiasts 
 trom sinking under their scanty diet — for they clung fondly to the hope 
 that they would become like him, although they increased daily in pallor 
 and leanness — this Haydon was discovered one day coming out of a chop- 
 house. He was promptly taxed with treachery, when he honestly confessed 
 that every day after the vegetable repast he ate a good beef-steak. This 
 fact plunged the others in despair, and Leigh Hunt assured me that on 
 vegetable diet his constitution had received a blow from which he had 
 never recovered. With Shelley it was different, for he was by nature 
 formed to regard animal food repulsively. It was on this occasion [Severn 
 proceeds after his ' aside ' about vegetarianism] that Keats was requested 
 by Haydon to recite his classical Ode to Pan from his unfinished poem 
 ' Endymion ;' which he forthwith gave with natural eloquence and great 
 pathos. When he had finished, we all looked in silence to Wordsworth 
 for praise of the young poet. After a moment's pause, he coolly remarked, 
 ' A very pretty piece of Paganism,' and with this cold water thrown upon 
 us we all broke up." 
 
 Following this account are a few passages concerning 
 Haydon, who was at this time occupied with his picture 
 of ' Christ entering Jerusalem.' When finished, the painter 
 
 D 
 
34 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 invited many distinguished artists to see it, among them 
 the sarcastic Northcote, who remarked : " Mr. Haydon, your 
 ass is the saviour of your picture " — " which severe critique 
 was actually true, for the animal was most wonderfully 
 painted, so wonderfully as to attract the eye at once." 
 
 Wordsworth one day complained that he found no 
 advance in the picture since the' time he had previously 
 examined it, on an earlier visit to London. "Mr. Haydon," 
 he said, " if you ever adopt a nickname, as the old painters 
 did, it must be Tenyears [Teniers] ; for you have been ten 
 years about this work." 
 
 In the spring of 1819, Severn, encouraged by the success 
 of his ' Cave of Despair,' decided to send his first oil painting, 
 ' Hermia and Helena,' to the Eoyal Academy. By this 
 time, also, he had become fairly successful, in a moderate 
 way, as a miniature-painter, and could occasionallv in- 
 dulge in the pleasure of painting one or other of his 
 friends "for love." Naturally, he wished to paint Keats, 
 who willingly agreed; and so, during the winter, the 
 painting was duly made and much admired by Keats's 
 brothers and friends.* Partly to please his friend, partly 
 in the hope of drawing attention to the almost un- 
 known young writer, and partly, no doubt, for his own 
 sake, Severn was anxious to send the miniature also to the 
 Eoyal Academy. He wrote to Keats, and told him of his 
 intention, and in reply received the following letter, 
 addressed to him at new rooms he had recently taken, 
 situated in Frederick Place, in the Goswell Eoad : — 
 
 " Wentworth Place, 
 
 " Monday Afternoon. 
 "My deab Severn, 
 
 " Your note gave me some pain, not on my own account, but on yours. 
 Of course I should never suffer any petty vanity of mine to hinder you in 
 any wise ; and therefore I should say, ' Put the miniature in the exhibi- 
 tion,' if only myself was to be hurt. But, will it not hurt you? What 
 
 * It was about this time [end of 1818 or early in 1819] that the 
 silhouette here reproduced was made. 
 
SILHOUETTE PORTRAIT OP KEATS, MADE OtrCO JANUARY, 1819. 
 
 lb fact page 31. 
 
EARLIEST VERSION OF KEATS' S 'FINGAL'S CAVE.' 35 
 
 good can it do to any future picture ? Even a large picture is lost in that 
 canting place — what a drop of water in the ocean is a miniature I Those 
 who might chanco to see it, for the most part, if they had ever heard of 
 either of us, and km w what we were and of what years, would laugh at 
 the puff of the one and the vanity of the other. I am, however, in these 
 matters a very bad judge, and would advise you to act in a way that 
 appeal's to yourself the best for your interest. As your ' Hermia and 
 Helena ' is finished send that without the prologue of a miniature. I shall 
 see you soon, if you do not pay me a visit sooner. There's a Bull 
 for you. 
 
 " Yours, ever sincerely, 
 
 "John Keats." 
 
 However, Keats was easily won to consent to his friend's 
 wish ; indeed, by this time, he had, as Severn records, 
 hegun to show a more and more frequent and more pro- 
 longed apathy. His immense vitality had enabled him 
 to withstand, with little apparent discomfiture, the insi- 
 dious approach of the deadly complaint which, no doubt, 
 had been induced, or at least hastened, by his undue 
 exposure to damp and fatigue while tramping through the 
 "West Highlands with his friend Brown. Though a journey 
 much enjoyed by Keats, and one ever memorable to lovers 
 of poetry, it was otherwise unfortunate.* Severn was asked 
 
 * There may be given here a variant of Keats's poem, ' On Fingal's 
 Cave.' This poem was written in Oban in July, 1818, when the author 
 and Charles Brown were on their pedestrian trip in Scotland. The 
 revised version was interpolated by Keats in his letter to his brother Tom 
 of 23rd and 26th July ; that is, in the latter portion. A copy of the first 
 draft was made by Brown, and by him seat to Severn. 
 
 On Fingal's Cave. 
 A Fragment. 
 
 Not Aladdin magian 
 Ever such a work began, 
 Not the wizard of the Dee 
 Ever such a dream could see ; 
 Not Saint John in Patmos Isle, 
 In the passion of his toil, 
 When he saw the churches seven, 
 Golden-aisl'd, built up in heav'n, 
 Gaz'd on such a rugged wonder ! 
 As I stood its roofing under, 
 Lo ! I saw one sleeping there 
 On the marble cold and bare, 
 
 D 2 
 
36 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 to join the party, and Haslam also ; but neither was able 
 to go, the former mainly from lack of funds to assist him 
 
 While the surges wash'd his feet, 
 
 And his garments white did beat, 
 
 Drench'd about the sombre rocks ; 
 
 On his neck his well-grown locks, 
 
 Lifted dry above the main, 
 
 Were upon the curl again. 
 
 " What is this ? and what art thou? " 
 
 Whisper'd I, and touch'd his brow. 
 
 " What art thou ? and what is this ? " 
 
 Whisper'd I, and strove to kiss 
 
 The spirit's hand, to wake his eyes, — 
 
 Up he started in a trice. 
 
 " I am Lycidas," said he, 
 
 " Fam'd in funeral minstrelsy ! 
 
 This was architectur'd thus 
 
 By the gnat Oceanus ! 
 
 Here his mighty waters play 
 
 Hollow organs all the day ; 
 
 Here his d' lphins, one and all, 
 
 Pinny palmers, great and small, 
 
 Come to pay devotion due, — 
 
 Each a mouth of pearls must strew. 
 
 Many a mortal ol these days 
 
 Dares to pass our sacred ways, 
 
 Dares to touch audaciously 
 
 This cathedral of the sea. 
 
 Here a fledgy sea-bird quire 
 
 Soars for ever ; holy fire 
 
 I have hid from mortal man, 
 
 Proteus is my Sacristan ! 
 
 But the dulled eye of mortal 
 
 Has dar'd to pass the rocky portal, 
 
 So for ever will I leave 
 
 Such a taint, and soon unweave 
 
 All the ma«ic of the place." 
 
 Thelnost notable variation is the absence in this earlier version of the 
 two lines coming in as thirty-ninth and fortieth in the later : — 
 
 I have been the Pontiff priest, 
 Where the waters never rest. 
 
 In the later too, the forty-first line is adapted to the above interpolation 
 by the substitution of Where for Here. The addition of 
 
 So saying, with a spirit's glance 
 He dived 
 
 seems to have been an afterthought with Keats. The verse does noi, 
 occur iu this copy: though it is faintly pencilled below, in another's 
 writing, which seems to me that of Keats. The other variations, i.e. 
 
DEATH OF TOM KEATS. 37 
 
 over even a very short journey, and also from his unwilling- 
 ness to cut himself adrift from what seemed his only safe 
 course if ever he were to do anything in Art. 
 
 One thing after another, says Severn, wrought at this 
 time to the undoing of his friend. A fever of the mind, 
 independent of the slow consuming evil fretting at the 
 edges of vitality, waxed and waned, exciting soul and body 
 to fierce activities and leaving them again to prostrating 
 apathies, '• to an apathy that was oftener akin to despair 
 than to mere dejection." 
 
 During the autumn of 1S18 Severn saw little of Keats. 
 When they did meet, he noticed that his friend was dis- 
 traught and without that look of falcon-like alertness which 
 was so characteristic of him ; and, later, that his face was 
 often haggard and his eyes strained, as though after pro- 
 longed and harassing vigils. Once Keats told his always 
 sympathetic comrade that not only was his brother dying, 
 but that with the ebbing tide of life was going more and 
 more of his own vitality. It certainly seemed as though 
 the poet were losing strength and energy, for he ceased 
 to take much interest in intellectual matters, and declared 
 himself unable to take long walks or even indulge in any 
 unnecessary exercise. Alarmed by something that Haslam 
 had told him, as to the frequency of a watcher by the bed- 
 side of a dying consumptive patient succumbing sooner 
 or later to the same malady, Severn did his utmost to 
 persuade Keats to take rooms near his brother, rather 
 than actually live with him, or at least to obtain the 
 assistance of a nurse ; and he even volunteered to release 
 his friend of his night-duties occasionally, but without 
 avail. Ere long the end came, though not until Keats 
 
 from the copy printed in Mr. Buxton Forman's edition of " Keats," are — 
 (line 5) " not Sahtt John in P ctmos isle " (and without any comma after 
 John) ; (line 7) lieav'n ; (line 8) " Gazed on," and with an interjection 
 after wonderl; (line 9) comma after under, ; (line 10), no comma after there; 
 (line 20) full stop at brow. ; (line 2b) comma and dash after eyes, — ; 
 (line 24) full stop at trice. ; (line 31) " Here his dolphins, one and all," ; 
 (line 39 MS.) Sere; (line 40) semicolon only after ever; and Holy; 
 (line 44) "Has dar'd to pass the rocky portal." 
 
38 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEBN. 
 
 had brought himself to the verge of illness. It was 
 Severn's intention to persuade his friend to accompany him 
 on a trip to Cornwall for a few weeks, to distract him after 
 Tom's death ; but that event occurred early in December, 
 and during a season of inclement weather, and so the 
 half-formed plan fell through. Nevertheless Keats was 
 persuaded by Charles Brown to leave the rooms where he 
 had suffered so much, and where. he had seen his dearly 
 loved brother slowly die, and to reside at his friend's house.* 
 Early in the spring of 1819, probably about the end of 
 February or in March, Keats, to all appearances in fair 
 health again, took Severn to call upon some "valued 
 friends and neighbours" — a Mrs. and Miss Brawne, who> 
 resided in the other portion of Wentworth Place, and 
 so were next door to Brown and his fellow-lodger. But 
 neither then nor till the poet's last days in Borne did 
 Severn realise the depth and passion of Keats's love for 
 Fanny Brawne; he was not even aware of any definite 
 engagement, though of course he knew that the poet was- 
 in love. Keats was very reticent, even with his most inti- 
 mate friends, and as he could be fiercely jealous, Severn, 
 as well as the others, thought it wiser to invite no con- 
 fidences, t Severn, indeed, despite certain contradictory 
 statements of his own in later life, knew that there was love 
 on one side at any rate — Brown's letters to him, both before 
 and during the sad early days in Eome, alone affording 
 sufficient proof of this — but in any case he was a prejudiced 
 witness, for to him Fanny Brawne always seemed a cold and 
 conventional mistress. Eeminiscently, he alluded to her 
 as like the draped figure in Titian's picture of ' Sacred and 
 Profane Love ; ' but on the first occasion of meeting her he 
 does not seem to have been at all deeply, or even favourably, 
 
 * Wentworth Place, in John Street, Hampstead. Now known as Lawn 
 Bank. 
 
 t That there was some feeling of this kind on the part of Keats seems 
 to be borne out by a remark in a letter to him from Miss Brawne, and by 
 his reply : " 1 mention a part of your letter which hurt me ; you say, 
 speaking of Mr. Severn, ' but you must be satisfied in knowing that I 
 admired you much more than your friend.' " 
 
THE ODE TO A NIGHTINGALE. 39 
 
 impressed. No doubt Keats noticed that his friend was not 
 enthusiastic about Miss Brawne ; possibly, indeed, Severn, 
 with his usual frankness, may have been too outspoken in 
 his strictures upon a style of beauty which had no fascina- 
 tion for him. On the other hand, he conceived a liking 
 for Mrs. Brawne, who was interested in the young artist, 
 and pleased with his gentle and conciliatory grace of 
 manner. 
 
 Yet it was at this time, as has been already stated, that 
 Keats and Severn deepened their friendship by frequent 
 long walks into the country ; and that the painter found 
 the poet so inspiring and even so joyous a companion. 
 For, notwithstanding the death of his youngest brother, the 
 strain of his secret gnawing passion, his untoward private 
 circumstances, and other causes of disquiet, Keats could in 
 company be as light-hearted as in his pugnacious schoolboy 
 days, and prove himself the most winsome of comrades. 
 
 This spring of 1819, which saw the real opening of 
 Severn's art-life, was, moreover, it must be remembered, 
 that wherein Keats's poetic powers reached their splendid 
 maturity. Before the weald of Hampstead had ceased to 
 ring with the cries of the cuckoos — then, as now, more 
 numerous there than anywhere else in the immediate 
 neighbourhood of London — the young poet had written, 
 besides some of his loveliest short poems, five at least 
 of those imperishable odes which to this day remain , 
 not only unsurpassed but unequalled. Charles Brown has 
 put on record one charming reminiscence of the poet at 
 this time: of a nightingale having built her nest in a 
 tree in the garden behind Wentworth Place, and of Keats's 
 delight in her mate's song, a delight which found perfect 
 and immortal expression in the Ode with which we are all 
 now so familiar. Severn gives much the same story, but 
 not so well, and more vaguely as to details, so I need not 
 add here his superfluous narrative. On the other hand, 
 Mr. Charles Severn tells me -that one night, when Keats 
 was spending the evening with friends at the large house 
 then (as well as the familiar group of pine-trees) known as 
 
40 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 1 The Spaniards,' he was missed. Joseph Severn, one of 
 the company, went to look for him, and discovered him 
 lying on the ground under the pines, and listening en- 
 tranced to the song of a nightingale overhead ; and either 
 that night or the following morning he wrote his famous 
 Ode. Severn afterwards painted a picture in exact illustra- 
 tion of this episode. 
 
 During the summer and early autumn of 1819 Severn 
 saw nothing of Keats, who was in the Isle of Wight and 
 afterwards in Winchester ; and as he heard nothing but 
 good news both from the invalid and his friends, he con- 
 cluded that there was no need of anxiety about Keats's well- 
 being. He himself was greatly occupied with his miniature- 
 painting, and though he was once sorely tempted to accept 
 Keats's invitation to join him for a few days in Winchester, 
 he found that he could afford neither the money nor the 
 time. While he was still deliberating upon a change, he 
 received a letter from Keats, with " College Street, West- 
 minster," as a heading, and on going thither was delighted 
 to learn that his friend had definitely returned to London, 
 and was about to pursue a literary career. At the same 
 time he could not help seeing that the southern change had 
 not wrought so much good as he had anticipated. The poet 
 was in high spirits, and charmed his companion beyond 
 expression by the odes and other short poems which he 
 .had recently written, and also by ' Hyperion,' against the 
 discarding of which Severn protested vehemently, though, he 
 complained, the author " seemed much more taken up with 
 a rhymed story about a serpent-girl " [' Lamia ']. Severn, 
 with his love of Milton, and perhaps with a natural pride 
 in having been instrumental in turning Keats's attention to 
 the noble beauty of ' Paradise Lost,' delighted immeasurably 
 in ' Hyperion,' lines of which haunted him ever afterwards. 
 But by this time the poet had decided to go no further 
 with his magnificent effort, not because he was dissatisfied 
 with it itself, but because he thought it too Miltonic in 
 structure, too artificial to suit his genius for a prolonged 
 strain, or even to please the highest taste. The very terms 
 
KEATS' S FIRST COLLAPSE. 41 
 
 in which Severn expressed his admiration of ' Hyperion ' 
 confirmed him in his resolution, for he did not, as he said, 
 want to write a poem " that might have been written by 
 John Milton, but one that was unmistakably written by no 
 other than John Keats." 
 
 Severn did not care, at first at any rate, for ' Lamia,' 
 but he promised to return one night ere long and hear 
 it and the rest of 'Hyperion.' In accordance with his 
 promise, though a week or more passed ere he could 
 allow himself a few hours of happy leisure, he called 
 at the house in College Street, but only to find that the 
 late inmate had fled to Hampstead, and for good. When, 
 the following Sunday, he saw Keats there, at his old 
 residence in Wentworth Place, he was perturbed by the 
 change in him. His friend seemed well neither in mind 
 nor in body, with little of the happy confidence and resolute 
 bearing of a week earlier ; while alternating moods of 
 apathetic dejection and spasmodic gaiety rendered him a 
 companion somewhat difficult to humour. Yet not even 
 then, in circumstances far more harassing than Severn had 
 any idea of, was Keats otherwise than kindly and generous. 
 " He never spoke of any one but by saying something in 
 their favour, and this always so agreeably and cleverly, 
 imitating the manner to increase your favourable impression 
 of the person he was speaking of." 
 
 Except Brown, Severn, and occasionally some other 
 faithful friend (besides George Keats, then in London on 
 business), Keats saw very few visitors in the winter of 1820. 
 Once or twice he was well enough to take a short walk with 
 Severn in the Highgate direction. Now and again he 
 " went into society," but with ever less relish, and at last 
 with so complete a distaste that he vowed to seek 
 entertainment there no more. It was about this time 
 that, with characteristic loyalty, he first expostulated with 
 and then indignantly left a company of acquaintances 
 because Severn was referred to slightingly and unjustly. 
 Long afterwards the artist often recalled the circum- 
 stance with pride, and also, it may be added, with a 
 
42 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 happy gratitude that made his telling of the episode 
 memorably winsome. 
 
 But soon after George Keats's departure for America to 
 rejoin his family, his brother endured his first absolute 
 collapse. As Severn gives substantially the same account 
 as the well-known narrative by Brown — from whom, indeed, 
 he learned the details — it is unnecessary to reproduce his 
 record of that first ominous symptom of fatal disease. 
 
 During the early spring weeks, when Keats was so much 
 an invalid that he was seldom even out of his room, 
 Severn occasionally went to Wentworth Place to have a 
 chat with his friend, though as he could not see him at 
 night his opportunities were naturally very limited. In 
 May, however, the poet was apparently so much better 
 (though he well knew himself how enfeebled he had 
 become), that he was able to sail as far as Grravesend with 
 Brown, who was bound for another tour in Scotland. So 
 deceptive, indeed, was his appearance that not only were 
 his friends misled, but even the physician suggested the 
 advisability of his again accompanying Brown. The latter, 
 one of the most genial and loyal of friends, started blithely 
 on his trip, not without some lingering hope that he might 
 be joined by Keats later on, certainly without the dimmest 
 prevision that he would never see his loved friend again. 
 
 Through May and June, however, Severn saw much of 
 Keats. Their intimacy was furthered by proximity, for 
 after Brown's departure Keats had gone to reside in 
 Kentish Town, so as to be near Leigh Hunt, who was then 
 living in Mortimer Street. But in June, at any rate, the 
 interviews grew shorter and shorter, and there were no more 
 drives or walks. About the 25th Severn received a brief 
 note from Leigh Hunt telling him that Keats had had one 
 or two severe attacks of haemorrhage, and had been removed, 
 to his house in Mortimer Street, so as to be under the im- 
 mediate care of himself and his wife. Thenceforth, till the 
 elder received through Haslam the sudden and startling 
 news of the younger's complete collapse, the two friends saw 
 very little of each other. Severn, indeed, seems to have been 
 
KEATS S DECISION TO GO TO ITALY. 43 
 
 under the impression that Keats was not more than a 
 month with the Hunts, and that he had then, feeling 
 comparatively restored, returned to Hampstead, or gone on 
 a visit to the Brawnes, whereas the invalid was close on 
 seven weeks in Mortimer Street, and would have been 
 longer but for an annoying piece of negligence on the part 
 of a servant,* which so wrought upon him (particularly as 
 the Hunts would not look on the matter seriously), that in 
 a fit of indignant anger he left his hosts, with the intention 
 of going to his old rooms in Well "Walk. Invalid as he 
 was, however, Mrs. Brawne would not hear of his being left 
 to his own resources ; and, though she was not overpleased 
 at the engagement which she knew existed, she insisted 
 upon her and her daughter's rights, in the circumstances, 
 to have him under their charge. 
 
 Although Keats had been told by his -doctor, while he 
 was an invalid under the care of the Hunts, that his sole 
 chance lay in absence from England during the damp winter 
 months, he avoided, seemingly, mention of this matter to 
 his friends. Always, scrupulously disinclined to trouble 
 others with his private affairs, the desperate state of his 
 health and almost equally bankrupt condition of his finances 
 no doubt made him still more reticent than his wont. He 
 hoped against hope, and even when it seemed folly to 
 refuse further to face the inevitable, he could not bring 
 himself to severance from her he loved so passionately, and 
 whose tendance during these summer weeks was to him so 
 poignantly sweet. Of course, some friends did hear of the 
 severity of the crisis in his fortunes; and the Leigh Hunts 
 in particular were kindly and well intentioned in all ways. 
 As is well known, he received at this time a generous 
 and most delicately-worded letter from Shelley, who had 
 heard of his evil straits, urging him to come to Fisa and be 
 taken care of as an honoured and welcome guest — an offer 
 which touched him deeply, but which he could not see his 
 way to accept. 
 
 At last the time came when a definite decision as to 
 * A note from Miss Brawne, delivered open, and two da^'s late. 
 
44 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 wintering abroad became imperative. Keats naturally 
 thought of Brown as the one possible companion for him, 
 if he ventured to Italy, as means and occupations stood in 
 the way of any other of his friends whom he could ask or 
 would care to have with him. Least of all did he think of 
 Severn, whose hard struggles he sympathised with, and 
 whose poverty was so pressing. 
 
 Early in the autumn he summoned up courage to endure 
 separation from Miss Brawne. He wrote to Brown, un- 
 folding his plans, and urging him, if possible, to- be his 
 comrade. But Brown was in the Highlands, and the letters 
 miscarried or followed tardily, and no tidings came from 
 him. Early in September cold and foggy weather set in, 
 and Keats became daily worse. It seemed, if it were to be 
 done at all, as if he would have to make his last venture 
 alone. 
 
SEVERN'S ART PROSPECTS. 45 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 Severn's Art prospects — Haslam asks Severn to go with Keats — Severn 
 decides" to go with Keats — A gloomy departure — Sailing of the Maria 
 Crowther — Keats's last poem — Incidents of the voyage — In quarantine 
 in the Bay of Naples — Keats and Severn in Naples — Keats's indigna- 
 tion in Naples— Keats and Severn in Rome — Their early life in Rome 
 —Keats's relapse. 
 
 So ill had fortune gone with Severn since his signal success 
 in winning the Eoyal Academy gold medal, that he at last 
 came to wish he had failed. Resentment among his fellow- 
 students, disparaging remarks in art circles, and ill-content 
 at home, made his life at times almost unendurable. If, he 
 wrote a few years later, he had enjoyed better health, and 
 had even had the most moderate resources to fall back 
 upon, he would have had absolutely no fear of winning his 
 way in London ; as it was, he was thankful that miniature- 
 painting promised to ensure him at least a living. But 
 even by the summer of 1819, when, following his success of 
 the previous December, he exhibited at the Academy his 
 'Hermia and Helena,' and his miniature of Keats, his 
 general prospects seemed no whit bettered. From the 
 acceptance and the exhibition of his picture and his 
 miniature he had hoped much. The former was exhibited 
 as No. 267, with the following quotation from 'A Midsummer 
 Night's Dream':*— 
 
 " We, Hermia, like two artificial gods, 
 Have with our needles created hoth one flower, 
 Both on one sampler, sitting on one cushion, 
 Both warbling of one song, both in one key, 
 As if our hands, our sides, voices and minds, 
 
 * Act III. Sc. ii. 
 
46 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Had been incorporate. So we grew together, 
 Like to a double cherry, seeming parted, 
 But yet an union in partition ; 
 Two lovely berries moulded on one stem ; . . . " 
 
 The subject was not in itself one calculated to attract 
 general attention, and in technique the picture was, 
 at most, a promising performance; the young painter, 
 indeed, had worked at it rather as a venture likely to gain 
 the approval of the public and of the convention-loving 
 Academicians, than with free will and enjoyment. On the 
 other hand, the miniature of Keats is an admirable bit of 
 portrait-painting. 
 
 But, of course, a miniature is apt to be overlooked by 
 nine-tenths of the visitors to an Academy Exhibition, and 
 if Severn had depended upon the effect the small portrait 
 of Keats would have upon his fortunes, he would have been 
 doomed to speedy and unmistakable disappointment. The 
 miniature was passed over without critical comment, but 
 'Hermia and Helena' was ill-hung, and unfavourably 
 noticed, and so, if it had any effect at all, brought the 
 young painter no good. 
 
 "Not a commission, not a penny came to me in con-^ 
 sequence," he writes; "and had it not been that I had 
 some favourably-priced miniatures to do on the occasion, I 
 verily believe this 'great honour' would have killed me, 
 for I should have been stunned by it, and certainly I lost 
 through it most of my student-friends." 
 
 Severn, writing long afterwards, somewhat confused his 
 sentiments in the summer of 1820 with those of the pre- 
 ceding year. Having alluded to the loss even of some of 
 his student- friends, he adds : " Indeed, I was reduced to 
 downright despair, and without the courage to go on with 
 another painting [of ' Titania Sleeping '] I had commenced, 
 when an incident turned up which put an end to all this 
 spiteful twaddle and ill-will by snatching me away from 
 the scene — at the same time opening to me a new and 
 glorious world of Art. Fortunately I had the courage to 
 make sure of it at the instant, and so gave a shape and 
 
HASLAM ASKS SEVERN TO 00 WITH KEATS. 47 
 
 seeming to my new life which otherwise it never could have 
 
 had." This, however, written retrospectively, applies rather 
 
 to Severn's state in the summer of 1819. Then he was 
 
 troubled by many things, distraught by unsatisfactory 
 
 prospects, and at times almost hopeless. He believed there 
 
 was no chance for him as a painter of pictures, and that if 
 
 he could not make sufficient name as a miniature-painter 
 
 to ensure himself a livelihood, he would have to yield to 
 
 his father's wish and definitely adopt the craft of the 
 
 «ngraver. But by midsummer of the year following that 
 
 of his first appearance as an exhibitor at the Royal 
 
 Academy, his prospects had materially improved. He 
 
 gained greatly, in his miniature-painting, in accuracy of 
 
 drawing and delicacy of tone, and so much admired were 
 
 his small portraits that there was every promise of his 
 
 success in this genre. He had, moreover, regained courage, 
 
 .and was looking forward to winning his way even as a 
 
 painter of historical and poetic subjects. For the first time 
 
 in his life he had some funds in reserve, and was able to 
 
 indulge moderately his love of music, the theatre, and 
 
 books. At last, too, his father had come round to the belief 
 
 that Joseph had been right in his aspirations, and, with 
 
 •characteristic inconsequence, began to prophesy for him a 
 
 career of most satisfactory and even brilliant success. 
 
 It was at this time, the early autumn of 1820, that " the 
 incident turned up " which " gave a shape and seeming to 
 his life which otherwise it never could have had." 
 
 One September evening William Haslam called on him, 
 and announced that the Italy idea for Keats was no longer 
 a vague suggestion, but was about to be carried into effect. 
 Severn was astonished, but was still more taken aback when 
 his visitor, after lamenting the absence in Scotland of 
 Charles Brown, and that individual's unfortunate though 
 understandable delay in replying to Keats's eager letters, 
 remarked that the poet, invalid though he was, would have 
 to go to Italy alone, and in a small vessel, unless he — 
 Severn — would make the venture for friendship's sake. 
 Writing long afterwards about this important crisis in 
 
48 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 his life, Severn is betrayed into one or two minor incon- 
 sistencies. Thus, in one set of ' Keminiscences,' he relates 
 the matter thus : — 
 
 " * * * Poor Keats was ordered to Italy to save his life, threatened by 
 misfortune and consumption. He was going alone, in a merchant-ship, to 
 Naples, and the voyage was all arranged, and he was to sail next day. 
 Haslam said to me, ' Severn, why suould you not go ? ' I answered, 
 ' Why should I not?' He then said, ' How long would it take you to get 
 ready?' 'If I can have six hours,' I said, 'in that time I'll be ready.' 
 Straight I went to Sir Thomas Lawrence, who gave me a letter to Canova, 
 and another to a German artist. On my way I went to my dear angel- 
 mother, who was not taken by surprise, but approved, and undertook to 
 get my trunk ready so that I might depart at daylight. During the even- 
 ing and night I managed to settle all my affairs, and with a solitary £25, 
 fortunately paid me for a miniature of a lady in a white satin bonnet and 
 feathers, I returned to my father's house just after midnight, to take fare- 
 well of my dear family, from whom I had never till then been (definitely) 
 separated." 
 
 This is a most circumstantial account, and has the ring 
 of actuality. But when we remember what travelling 
 arrangements were in those days, how difficult it would 
 be for even a young man like Severn to disarray his 
 rooms and put his affairs in order, make calls (particularly 
 to take ' on the way ' a house in distant Hoxton while going 
 to visit Sir Thomas Lawrence in central London), all in a 
 few hours, one might be excused for some incredulity. 
 Still, there would be no just cause for taking the account 
 " with a difference," especially as an almost childlike 
 candour characterised the writer, if it were not for the 
 latter's own conflicting statements recorded at an earlier 
 date. Here is the other version : — 
 
 " Haslam said to me, ' As nothing can save Keats tut going to Italy, 
 why should you not try to go with him, for otherwise he must go alone,, 
 and we shall never hear anything of him if he dies. Will you go ? ' I 
 answered, ' I'll go.' ' But you'll be long getting ready,' he added ; ' Keats 
 is actually now preparing. When would yon be ready ? ' 'In three or 
 four days,' I replied, ' and I will set about it this very moment.' " 
 
 The two accounts tally after this, except as to the hurried 
 calls and sudden departure, and taking Mrs. Severn's house 
 in Hoxton on the way to see Sir Thomas Lawrence. There 
 
SEVERN DECIDES TO GO WITH KEATS. 49 
 
 is no evidence to prove which is the true account. How- 
 ever, the matter is unimportant ; what is significant is 
 Severn's generous readiness to accompany his invalid friend 
 at whatever cost to himself, and to lose no time in putting 
 his decision into effect. With his sanguine temperament, 
 it is quite likely, as he says, that, as soon as the suggestion 
 was made to him and he realised its significance, he foresaw 
 the possibility of his gaining at Rome the Eoyal Academy's 
 travelling studentship, as a sequence to the bestowal of the 
 gold medal ; but whatever purely personal motive may 
 have affected his decision, he must have all the credit due 
 to him for his generous loyalty. No one who knew Joseph 
 Severn could doubt that 'he would have gone to Italy with 
 Keats even if there had been no Eoyal Academy students'- 
 pension in prospect, and if he had had no capital beyond 
 his twenty-five pounds, his industry, his genial temper, 
 good spirits, and winsome manners. 
 
 It is certainly not enough simply to say of his action, 
 with Mr. Sidney Golvin, that " a companion offered himself 
 in the person of Severn, who, having won, as we have seen, 
 the gold medal of the Royal Academy the year before, 
 determined now to go and work at Rome with a view to 
 competing for the travelling studentship." This determina- 
 tion was, at most, an afterthought, and,- as Severn says, 
 realisation of the hope was just barely possible. 
 
 Although Mrs. Severn sympathised with her son's plan, 
 partly because she admired his motive, and partly because 
 she understood plainly that the scheme was a turn in his 
 dubious fortunes which might well be for the better (for she 
 seems all along to have more clearly understood Joseph's 
 chances and prospects in London than even Mr. Severn did, 
 in his range from the most sombre outlook to the most 
 sanguine expectations), the decision was received by 
 Severn's father with the utmost consternation. 
 
 " This determination of mine," he writes, " was almost a 
 death-blow to my poor dear father, who reasoned with me 
 in every way as to the rashness of the step, and pointed out 
 that by thus taking matters into my own hands I might 
 
 E 
 
50 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEBN. 
 
 even forfeit my chance of gaining the Academy pension. 
 But I had no ear to his arguments, and as I had certainly 
 the virtue of the donkey — obstinacy — in the highest degree, 
 so my plan went on preparing." 
 
 It has already been stated that Severn called upon Sir 
 Thomas Lawrence to tell him of his decision to go to Rome, 
 as, presumably, he believed to be the right thing to do. 
 The great man received him kindly, and not only wrote for 
 him a letter of introduction to Canova, "and to an old 
 German artist resident in Rome, who had done a large 
 copy and an engraving from Michael Angelo's ' Last Judg- 
 ment,' " but invited him to make any remarks he felt 
 inclined to express upon the works in the studio wherein 
 he then stood. Vanity, it is to be feared, must have 
 prompted this complaisance on the part of Sir Thomas, and 
 it is amusing to find that the young and almost self-taught 
 artist calmly criticised a large portrait of George IV. as 
 " unnatural." 
 
 Severn does not seem to have seen Keats since his 
 decision to accompany the latter, but to have arranged 
 with Haslam that both should meet on board the vessel, 
 which was a schooner named the Maria Crowiher, destined 
 to sail from Gravesend on the 18th. The young artist's 
 departure from his home was marred by an untoward event, 
 which seems to have made a strong and painful impression 
 upon him, for twice in late life he gave a detailed written 
 account of the incident, and refers to it in his letters, as> 
 he often did to friends in conversation about his early 
 experiences. His father, as there was occasion to mention 
 earlier in this memoir, was subject to violent alternations of 
 temper, and, when crossed, would sometimes remain long in 
 a state of sullen anger or else expend his wrath in spasmodic 
 fits of fury. He was greatly perturbed by Joseph's decision 
 to throw up his chances in London and venture to Rome, 
 and his mingled sorrow and anger had grown to resentment 
 by the time his son was ready to depart. 
 
 "It was after midnight [i.e. on the 17th] when I reached home, and I 
 found my father sunk down with extreme grief in his armchair. At last, 
 
A QLOOMT DEPAETUBE. 51 
 
 when my mother and sisters had finished packing my trunk, and the time 
 had come for me to leave, my brother Tom and I tried to lift up the trunk, 
 but it was beyond us, and so I asked my father for his help. He rose up 
 in an apparent passion of madness, and swore that if without his touching 
 it the trunk was never to be lifted at all, it should not be touched by him. 
 This was a terrible change in his demeanour, for which I was quite 
 unprepared. No time was to be lost, and so I proceeded to go upstairs to 
 (take farewell of) my younger brother. My poor father, in his abstrac- 
 tion,* stood in the doorway, and when I attempted to pass him he struck 
 me down to the ground. This made a tragic scene of it, for his love for 
 me was unbounded ; indeed, his often-avowed delight in my company, and 
 my being his eldest son, conspired to make this blow like the act of mad- 
 ness. My dear mother interposed, as also my sister and friends, to protect 
 me. Tom, then nineteen years old and strong, held my father against the 
 door, but required assistance to do it effectually. With my dear home in 
 this most melancholy plight I had to leave, and did leave with such 
 agitation and trembling nerves that I was obliged to be supported for a 
 few minutes. All this was long before daylight, and the gloom seemed to 
 increase the horror attendant on my departure." 
 
 It was certainly a painful and distressing leave-taking, 
 and a dispiriting beginning of a new period in life. 
 It says well for Severn that he bore not the slightest 
 resentment to his father, and that, soon after he had fairly 
 settled in Rome, he wrote a pleasant and affectionate 
 letter, in which no allusion was made to the unfortunate 
 ebullition of temper which had made departure seem 
 tragically sad, and had, indeed, so wrought upon the chief 
 sufferer that, were it not for the deep disappointment 
 and possible peril to Keats, he would even then have 
 renounced the venture. Severn was equally generous in 
 advanced life, when the infelicities of the past are often 
 apt to reappear through an atmosphere more sombre than 
 they ever knew. 
 
 Even after leaving the painful scene described above, he 
 says, his mind was filled with thoughts of his "poor dear 
 father," 
 
 " whom I knew to be so devoted to me, and who had lost his senses in 
 our parting. He was always a man of most ardent temperament, and 
 
 * Severn's use of this word " abstraction " here is interesting, for he 
 does not indicate " absence of mind " as the word now commonly does, but 
 aberration or some equivalent word. 
 
 E 2 
 
52 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 sudden and violent in his anger when it was roused : but, withal, so good 
 a man, so honest and sincere, so benevolent, so generous to all about him, 
 that the good qualities far outbalanced the bad." 
 
 Naturally enough the journey to the docks, in the gloom 
 that slowly became the chill morning twilight, was one of 
 the most unhappy episodes in Severn's life. He was 
 haunted, moreover, by a fear that his action had unsettled 
 his father's mind, and that his dearly-loved mother and 
 her children would have to endure sorrow and privation in 
 consequence. But as the Thames was approached, his 
 wonted buoyant spirits rose once more, and by the time his 
 brother Tom had said good-bye he was less despairful and 
 unhappy, though, to add to his discomfort of mind and body, 
 he was suffering at the time from liver complaint. Yet, 
 withal, there was the natural exhilaration of youth in the 
 front of a new if dubious venture. 
 
 When he arrived at the wharf on the south side of the 
 river, he found " dear Keats, John Taylor the publisher " 
 (through whose liberality in advancing the poet £100 for 
 the copyright of ' Endymion ' the preliminaries of the 
 journey had been expedited and rendered easier in other 
 ways), and William Haslam." * There were other friends 
 besides these, but Severn does not specify them. The 
 Maria Crowther was not a very inviting vessel in which to 
 make a lengthy voyage. She was a schooner-merchantman, 
 and but ill-adapted (and, as it proved, ill-provisioned) for 
 the conveyance of passengers. In one account Severn says 
 that he and Keats embarked at Gravesend, but elsewhere 
 (and this seems the fact) they got aboard before the vessel 
 sheered off from the wharf, and slowly swung down upon the 
 tide to Gravesend, where the schooner lay-to till well on in 
 the morning, and where a lady passenger joined the small 
 company. Here Severn, at Keats's special request, went 
 ashore and bought several medicines, some of them prepared 
 according to the direction of the latter, and among them a 
 
 * By a slip of the pen, Severn mentions Charles Brown as one of those 
 who were present. See below, for the almost tragical by-play of circum- 
 stance whereby the two friends missed each other at the last moment, 
 though within hail of each other*. 
 
SAILING OF THE "MARIA CROWTHER." 53 
 
 bottle of laudanum. Soon the last good-byes were said, and 
 all Keats's friends were agreeably surprised by his anima- 
 tion and apparently more robust health : though, as a 
 matter of fact, the recovery was but a matter of the moment, 
 and a week or two later he was in a more hopeless state 
 than before. 
 
 There is an almost tragic touch of that maladroitness of 
 circumstance which so often wrought cruelly for Keats, in 
 the fact that, all unknown to each other, he and Charles 
 Brown were within hail during the dark hours of that 
 morning. Brown, grievously alarmed by the receipt of one 
 of the urgent letters which had at last reached him in the 
 Highlands, had hurried back with all practicable speed. The 
 nearest port for him to catch a London-bound vessel was 
 Dundee, but on arrival there he found that there was no 
 boat southward-bound save a small coaster, little larger than 
 a fishing-smack. In this he embarked, and on the night of 
 the 17th of September the small vessel came up the estuary, 
 and after midnight brought-to off Gravesend. Severn 
 relates that the two vessels lay within a stone's-throw of 
 each other, and that if Brown had been on the deck of the 
 sloop he might have heard the voices of those on the Maria 
 Crowther, and thus been saved the keen regret which he 
 experienced ever after. Almost everything told against 
 Keats from the outset. The start in the chill morning- 
 gloom — and, earlier, from Mr. Taylor's house — wrought him 
 no good, for though he was alert and seeming fairly well 
 during the first days of the voyage, his excitement, was 
 really in great part due to a feverish chill, which made 
 him abnormally restless. The food on board was indifferent, 
 and the accommodation bad; and for the greater part of 
 the voyage the weather was unfavourable. What was 
 perhaps as unfortunate as anything else was the fact that 
 a lady passenger who had joined at Gravesend, a Miss 
 Cotterell, was a consumptive invalid, and in that morbid 
 stage when specification of one's symptoms and ailments 
 becomes, apparently, a burning necessity. While still in 
 the Channel Keats had, indeed, some days of seeming good 
 
54 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 health, but long before reaching Naples lie was much the 
 worse instead of the better for his voyage. 
 
 There was only one other passenger besides Keats, 
 Severn, and Miss Cotterell — a Mrs. Pidgeon. 
 
 " I could not have made much of a figure," writes Severn, " for before 
 we left Gravesend a lady-friend of one of those on board looked hesitatingly 
 at Keats and myself and inquired which was the dying man. I was 
 suffering at the lime from liver complaint, and was very pale and wan. 
 The sea and I have always been enemies, and as this voyage to Naples was 
 long before steam-vessels were in use, I was destined to pass some weeks 
 in sad penance. My dinner was a matter that always came to light : but, 
 as for Keats, he bore the sea manfully. I was continually sea-sick during 
 the fortnight in which we were beating about the Channel — a tedious and 
 disagreeable time with adverse and trying winds. Miss Ootterell was a 
 mere shadow, and although very agreeable and ladylike, it was unfortunate 
 for Keats to have a vis-cu-vis in such a state, for they were constant com- 
 panions and always comparing notes. The schooner was often close into 
 the coast, and the captain gave leave to his passengers to go ashore at one 
 or two places " — Dungeness, Studland Bay, Dorchester, and Portsmouth, 
 are specified by Severn. " At Dungeness we scrambled over the gravel ; 
 and on the opposite side I was astonished and delighted with the enormous 
 waves, at least ten feet high, rushing in upon the shore. The sight fixed 
 me in wonder and abstraction, until a miserable exciseman appeared and 
 demanded what I was doing. My bewildered explanation only confirmed 
 his suspicion that 1 was looking out for contraband — which let down all 
 the high romance which the waves had inspired." Off the Dorset coast 
 the schooner one day lay becalmed, and Keats ventured ashore with his 
 friend. " For a moment," says the latter, " he became like his former self. 
 He was in a part that he already knew, and showed me the splendid 
 caverns aud grottos with a poet's pride, as though they had been his by 
 birthright. When we returned to the ship he wrote for me on a blank 
 leaf in a folio volume of Shakespeare's ' Poems,' which had been given him 
 by a friend, and which he gave to me in memory of our voyage, the 
 following magnificent sonnet : — 
 
 " Bright star, would I were steadfast as thou art, 
 
 Not. in lone splendour hung aloft the night 
 Aud watching, with eternal lids apart, 
 
 Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite, 
 The moving waters at their priestlike task 
 
 Of pure ablution round earth's human shores, 
 Or gazing on the new solt-fallen mask 
 
 Of snow upon the mountains and the moois — 
 No— yet still s-teadfast, still unchangeable, 
 
 Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast, 
 
{From Severn's Journal of the Voyage, written day by day on board the Maria Crowtker.] 
 
 yO 
 
 i 
 
 Q 
 
 
 An 
 
 ~/U-*s?* *^U^H?£c~ 4* f^*r e^* /^ 
 
 ' ^/^^^ 
 
 "Tt^ st^AsiSj^y p£*~ r *~ s&/*+* eJ — 
 
 A^. 4/tr 
 
 
KEATS' S LAST POEM. 55 
 
 To feel for over its soft fall and swell, 
 
 Awake for ever in a sweet unrest, 
 Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath, 
 And so live ever — or else swoon to death." 
 
 This always remained Severn's favourite among Keats's 
 poems, partly from association, and partly from the solemn 
 calm and beauty of it. It was hurriedly pencilled down by 
 Keats, and shortly afterward read by him to his companion, 
 who eagerly begged the poet to give him a copy — with the 
 result that he obtained both the first transcript of the sonnet 
 .and the author's treasured copy of Shakespeare's Poems. 
 
 " This," says Severn, " was the very last poetical effort the poor fellow 
 ever made. Thenceforward nothing but letters with pathetic anticipa- 
 tion of approaching fate. But this sublime sonnet inspired me with the 
 hope that he might recover. Indeed this hope was never absent from my 
 mind, and I never once realised the likelihood of our speedy separation by 
 death. At times in his suffering he still retained that elasticity of mind 
 and spirit which was the characteristic of both the man and the poet. 
 Perhaps at times he made a greater effort on my account, as he was 
 painfully sensible of what he called the great sacrifice I was making on 
 his account, and that it might turn out disastrous to me as a young 
 artist. He seemed to feel more for me than for himself, for he had already 
 given himself up for lost. The mysterious power of his genius held him 
 up when he was actually sinking, and held me up in the strained hopes 
 thus inspired." 
 
 When the vessel was detained by a strong adverse wind 
 in the Solent, the two again went on shore, and as they 
 were assured that there was no chance of getting forward 
 that day, Keats took the opportunity of visiting some 
 friends at Bedhampton. On his return to the schooner he 
 spent the evening writing a long and most pathetic letter 
 to Brown : and here, again, by a strange perversity of fate, 
 the two friends were near each other without being aware 
 of the fact. Keats thought Brown still in Scotland, and 
 Brown naturally believed that the Maria Crowther was by 
 that time, ten days after departure, in or near the Bay of 
 Biscay. When he had discovered how closely he had 
 missed Keats at Gravesend he was deeply chagrined. He 
 did not care to go home just then, and went on a visit to 
 Mr. Dilke at Chichester, where he was on the day when 
 
56 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEBN. 
 
 Keats, having nothing better to do, went to Bedhampton — 
 when he might more easily have gone to the Dilkes' home — 
 and where he spent the evening perhaps thinking of his 
 friend upon the high seas, while that friend was in a ship 
 riding at anchor in the Solent, and engaged in a long letter 
 to no other than himself. It is, in truth, an intensely 
 pathetic letter, and nowhere more so than where the dying 
 young poet exclaims that he wishes for death every day 
 and night to deliver him from the pains of bis fruitless 
 and consuming passion. "Land and sea, weakness and 
 decline, are great separators, but Death is the great 
 divorcer for ever," he writes, in despairful resignation. 
 
 That brief time among the Lulworth sea-caves and fan- 
 tastic rocks was among the last few relatively happy hours 
 which Keats knew, for even in his partial rally in Borne 
 he was always as one moving about under a sentence of 
 imminent death. He was in his element then, a child of 
 Nature. His mind, as his friend says of him, " lived on 
 such things, and whatever may have been his other resources, 
 certainly the great incentive of his immortal poetry was 
 his actual converse with Nature, and on this occasion I 
 could well see how Nature and he understood each other." 
 But at last, " after about a fortnight's misery," a favourable 
 wind enabled them to leave Land's End out of sight astern, 
 and Keats, who, on the whole, had almost enjoyed and had 
 seemed to benefit by the voyage hitherto, eagerly hoped 
 for fair and milder weather. 
 
 " But in the Bay of Biscay we encountered a three days" 
 storm. The sea swept over the ship all day and night, and 
 the rushing up and down of the water in the cabin was a 
 frightful sound in the darkness. I was afraid that Keats 
 might die, for we were confined to our berths, without food 
 and without aid or attendance of any kind; and it was 
 impossible for me to go to his assistance." Keats, however, 
 withstood the wretched discomforts as well as Severn, and 
 even managed to indulge in his old habit of punning. 
 "After the first dreary night, just when the dawn was 
 peeping, and the storm temporarily abated, I called to him, 
 
INCIDENTS OF THE VOYAGE. 57 
 
 'This is pretty sea- music, Keats, isn't it?' 'Yes,' he 
 answered to my relief, 'it is water parted from the 
 sea' (the first line of a Vauxhall song then all the 
 vogue). " 
 
 In the favourable weather which ensued the two friends 
 read aloud ' Don Juan ' to each other ; but Keats resented 
 the mocking cynicism of the shipwreck canto, and was so 
 wrought upon that at last he flung the volume aside in 
 contemptuous anger. With all his nature craving for 
 sympathy and tenderness (himself the most tender as well 
 as one of the manliest of English poets), and at the same 
 time so near his own life's shipwreck, he could not enjoy 
 Byron's brilliant stanzas. 
 
 The storm deeply impressed both : 
 
 " On the second morning I ventured up to peep over the cabin door, and 
 was astonished at the grandeur of the sea. The waves were of an enormous 
 length, and so high that the effect was like a mountainous country, and it 
 was a cheering sight to see how nicely the ship met each wave and rode 
 over it diagonally. I lost all fear in this sublime sight, and for the rest of 
 the storm was a continual watcher, even to the lightning. When off Cape 
 St. Vincent the weather changed and a dead calm ensued, and a great relief it 
 was, to the passengers at any rate. Once more we were all in each other's 
 company at dinner, and congratulated ourselves the more heartily when 
 we heard from the captain that he had had fears for the ship, which 
 had laboured heavily in the trough of the seas. Keats was greatly im- 
 pressed by the beauty of the ocean off Cape St. Vincent. It was smooth 
 as oil, and all one undulating motion, and with the bright sun shining on 
 it we saw many large and strange fish ; and once, to our delight and 
 excitement, a whale appeared on the surface. The follow ing day, although 
 the calm still prevailed, we found ourselves in proximity to some Portu- 
 guese men-of-war, particularly a large four-decker, the San Josef. We 
 were leaning over the taffrail, looking at this unwieldy monster in the 
 distance flapping on the idle waves, when a shot passed close under the 
 cabin-window. The captain, who was shaving, rushed on deck, to dis- 
 cover that a gun had been fired at us for not answering the signals on 
 board the Portuguese man-of-war. While he was still looking seaward 
 bewilderedly (for he had heard a previous discharge, though we had not, 
 and had fancied the commodore was simply signalling to his fleet), the 
 San Josef had drifted close enough for communication by speaking- 
 trumpet. Some one shouted in English, demanding to know if we had 
 recently seen any ships, particularly any vessels that looked like privateers. 
 Many semi-piratical sloops were at that time known to be sailing for 
 South America, which was then beginning to emancipate itself from the 
 
58 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 corrupt and tyrannical dominion of Spain and Portugal. The captain 
 answered that we had encountered no vessels of any kind. We had to 
 approach near to the immen>-e ship, and it was a most fearful sight as 
 regards the savage, dirty sailors, who showed themselves at every point, 
 even high up the rigging. After further inquiries and answers, we were 
 allowed to drift on, but not without genuiue fear and trembling on the 
 part of our captain, who held the Portuguese in dire mistrust. That after- 
 noon we encountered an English sloop-of-war, clean and brilliant com- 
 pared with the Portuguese — na}', the very antipodes to it. Its commander, 
 having inquired and heard that we had been stopped by the San Josef 
 and other war-ships, promptly turned about in pursuit in gallant style. 
 We afterwards discovered that the Portuguese admiral was not so much 
 on the look-out for South American privateers as cruising about to intercept 
 vessels going to the aid of Spain, which was at that time in a state of 
 civil war, with Don Carlos striving for the crown." 
 
 It would be impracticable to follow any one of Severn's 
 three sets of reminiscences in the following narrative ; for 
 not only does he indulge in much circumlocution, but is 
 often contradictory, and even, not infrequently, negligent 
 in his statements ; as when, for example, he says that, one 
 evening, the Maria Crowiher came in sight of Gibraltar, and 
 next morning . was in the Bay of Naples ! Consistently 
 with the plan of this memoir, his own record will be given 
 intact where practicable, and otherwise his words will be 
 woven from his several reminiscences and letters of a later 
 date. 
 
 " We passed Gibraltar before dawn, and could but just see the enormous 
 outline ; a little later, however, we saw the coast of Barbary lit up by the 
 sun's fiery rays — a scene of great beauty, by which Keats was deeply 
 impressed. Behind us lay the mass of Gibraltar, now all glowing like a 
 vast topaz ; around us a wide expanse of ocean, calm and yet full of life 
 and motion with the favouring westerly breeze ; beyond us, a sunlit waste 
 of dancing shimmering wavelets; and, seeming close to starboard, so 
 translucent was that fine air, the African coast, here golden, and there 
 blue as a sapphire, stretching away into a pearly haze. Keats lay 
 entranced, and with a look of serene abstraction upon his worn face; while 
 I, glad of the easy motion and the genial warmth, sat near and made a 
 sketch in water-colours. The remainder of our voyage was in favourable 
 weather, and was as pleasant as the unsatisfactory conditions on board 
 permitted. At last, at the end of six weeks,* we entered the beautiful 
 
 * That is, after four weeks and three days. The Maria Crowiher 
 reached the Bay of Naples on the 21st of October, and lay in quarantine 
 till noon on the 1st of November. 
 
IN QUARANTINE IN THE BAY OF NAPLES. 59 
 
 Buy of Naples. It would be difficult to depict in words the first sight of 
 this Paradise as it appears from the sea. The white houses were lit up 
 with the rising sun, which had just began to touch them, and being tier 
 above tier upon the hill-slopes, they had a lovely appearance, with so much 
 green verdure and the many vineyards and olive grounds about them. 
 Vesuvius had an immense line of smoke-clouds built up, which every now 
 and then opened and changed with the sun's golden light, edging and com- 
 posing all kinds of groups and shapes in lengths and masses for miles. 
 Then the mountains of Sorrento to the right seemed like lapis lazuli and 
 gold ; the sea between being of a very deep blue 6uch as we had not seen 
 elsewhere, and so rich and beautiful that it gave great splendour to all the 
 objects on shore. So lovely was the ever-changing scene that we were not 
 so bitterly chagrined as we would otherwise have been when we were 
 informed that we were placed in quarantine for ten days, owing to the 
 fact that there was then an epidemic of typhus in London, and it was 
 feared that we might have brought the contagion. Keats was simply 
 entranced with the unsurpassable beauty of the panorama, and looked 
 longingly at the splendid city of Naples and her terraced gardens and 
 vineyards, upon the long range of the Apennines, with majestic Vesuvius 
 emitting strange writhing columns of smoke, golden at their sunlit fringes, 
 and upon the azure foreground covered with ships and all manner of 
 white-sailed small craft. It was a relief to me that he was so taken out 
 of himself, for he was often so distraught, with so sad a look in his eyes, 
 with, moreover, sometimes, a starved, haunting expression that bewildered 
 me. Yet at that time I never fully understood how terrible were his 
 mental sufferings, for so excruciating was the grief that was eating away 
 his life that he could speak of it to no one. He was profoundly depressed 
 the day we went ashore at Naples, though he had been so eager to leave 
 the ship and explore the beautiful city ; indeed, I was more alarmed on 
 his behalf that night than even during that wretched three days' storm in 
 the Bay of Biscay. 
 
 " But, as I have said, the first day or two of our quarantine were 
 delightful, even to the two invalids, though Miss Cotterell had become much 
 worse, and was, indeed, a most trying companion for my poor sensitive 
 friend. It was a delight to hear him talk of the classic scenes he seemed 
 to know so well ; he made it all live again, that old antique world when 
 the Greek galleys and Tyrhenian sloops brought northward strange tales 
 of what was happening in Hellas and the mysterious East. He could 
 even be gay before Miss Cotterell, for he seemed to breathe an inspiration 
 from the lovely environment. There was constant entertainment, too, in 
 the people surrounding our ship, as they passed by playing upon their 
 guitars and singing songs, or came alongside to barter with us. 
 
 " Our schooner was anchored near the Castell' d' Uovo, and was soon, 
 and constantly afterwards, surrounded by scores of Neapolitan boats with 
 gorgeous heaps of autumnal fruits — grapes, peaches, figs, melons, and many 
 other kinds I had never before seen, all in such abundance that it seemed 
 as though we had arrived at the Enchanted Island — an illusion heightened 
 
' 60 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 by the endless array of picturesque skiffs and shallops, with sweet stirring 
 music coming from many of them, the tinkling of the guitars mingling 
 with happy laughter and innumerable shouts, cries, and exclamations of 
 all kinds. Perhaps the novelty alone was an irresistible charm, and made 
 our haven seem, to me at least, as though it were the shore of Paradise." 
 
 It must, indeed, as Severn says elsewhere, have been a 
 delightful experience for the young artist who had seen sa 
 little that was beautiful ; and had Keats only been able to 
 enjoy it aright, the time would have passed happily indeed. 
 
 " Some company unexpectedly joined us. The English Fleet was then 
 in the Bay, and seeing the Union Jack flying at the mast-head of the 
 Maria Orowther, the admiral sent an officer with a boat's crew to inquire 
 who and what we were. Instead of remaining alongside to make his 
 inquiries, Lieutenant Sullivan came aboard with six out of his ten men — 
 and so transgressed the strict rule of quarantine. In consequence, they 
 had to spend the ensuing ten days on board the Maria Crowthei — the 
 only annoying thing about which was the lack of proper accommodation ;. 
 for we were well supplied with innumerable luxuries as well as all the 
 necessities. The men enjoyed their spell of idleness, and the joking that 
 constantly went on ; Lieutenant Sullivan made himself quite at home ;. 
 and altogether we had cause to congratulate ourselves upon his thoughtless^ 
 oversight. His advent, and the constant pleasurable excitement after all 
 our monotony and discomfort, was not only delightful, but had a markedly 
 beneficial effect upon poor Keats, who apparently became much better,, 
 and indeed revived to be almost like himself. There was yet another 
 unexpected companion in the person of Mr. Cotterell, a brother to the 
 invalid lady-passenger. Mr. Cotterell, who was a banker in Naples, and knew 
 the strictness of the quarantine regulations, at first contented himself with 
 coming alongside the Maria Crowther, and supplying not only his sister 
 but her companions (to whom he expressed himself as most grateful for 
 their unintermitting kindness and attention to Miss Cotterell) with alt 
 manner of dainties and luxuries. Keats was never tired of admiring (not 
 to speak of eating !) the beautiful clusters of grapes and other fruits, and 
 was scarce less enthusiastic over the autumnal flowers, though I remember 
 his saying once that he would gladly give them all for a wayside dog-rose 
 bush covered with pink blooms. But after a day or two Mr. Cotterell, 
 concerned about the delicate state of his sister, made his arrangements in 
 .Naples, and then came aboard to shave our enforced isolation. Not only 
 was he unbounded in his direct kindness to Keats and myself, and a boon 
 to all, for he kept the company supplied with every delicacy in fruit, fish, 
 and fowl that could be procured in Naples ; but he was also most welcome, 
 for he knew Italian thoroughly, and — what was much better so far as our 
 amusement was concerned— the Neapolitan lazzaroni-patois. Lieutenant 
 Sullivan was amusing also, and altogether we had a fund of entertainment 
 to draw upon at all times. The whole day long, after our advent and our 
 
KEATS AND SEVERN IN NAPLES. 61 
 
 boarding by Lieutenant Sullivan and bis crew, we were encircled by the 
 joyous Neapolitans; for it seemed that the uncommon accident of having 
 an English naval officer and six man-of-war's men entrapped into quaran- 
 tine on board a small merchant-schooner, brought hundreds, I am tempted to 
 say thousands, to laugh and be merry at the expense of the blunderers. 
 Mr. Cotterell translated the jokes and gibes, and caused tis and our visitors 
 continued roars of laughter. All kinds of chaff went on, and Keats was 
 not behind either Mr. Cotterell or Lieutenant Sullivan in witty puns and 
 remarks. The fun, the laughing, the singing, all contributed to increase 
 the brilliant holiday scene, so much so that at the expiry of our ' isolation ' 
 I could not help feeling regret — for, altogether, it was to me a scene of 
 such splendour and gaiety as I had never imagined and did not expect to 
 realise again. Moreover, we were told, as was the case, that once on land 
 the disenchantment would begin, that all the wonderful charm would vanish. 
 Even after half a century, it is all still vividly before my eyes, as vividly 
 as though it were present. Keats was very brilliant in the midst of this 
 gay scene, and his ready wit always forms a part of it in my memory. 
 
 " But at last the day came when we had to say good-bye to our worthy 
 Captain and to Lieutenant Sullivan, though not to Mr. Cotterell, who kindly 
 ■conducted us to the Hotel d' Inghilterra, as he could not manage to accom- 
 modate others besides his invalid sister, and insisted upon our promising 
 to let him be our friend and cicerone during our stay in the city. Indeed, 
 we were almost persuaded into promising to make that stay indefinitely 
 long ; though, as a matter of fact, it came to an end even sooner than we ever 
 intended. Despite the warnings which had been given us, when we landed 
 in the city that looked so beautiful from the sea, we were quite taken 
 aback by the dirt, the noise, and the smell. Everything seemed offensive, 
 except the glorious autumnal atmosphere, and the sense of light and joy 
 of the vintage, which was everywhere in evidence. With songs and 
 laughfer and cries, and endless coming and going, the whole city seemed 
 in motion. The men ran to and fro with their baskets of grapes, bawling 
 and screaming with mere delight apparently, not one here and there, but 
 everywhere and all at once. The city itself, with its indiscriminate noises 
 and bewildering smells, struck us as one great kitchen, for cooking was 
 going on in every street and at almost every house — at, not in, for it was 
 all done out-of-doors or upon the thresholds. At every corner was a bare- 
 legged Neapolitan devouring macaroni and roaring for more ; mariners 
 in red caps were hawking fish at the tip-top of their voices ; and every- 
 where beggars were strumming guitars or howling ballads. The whole 
 occupations of the citizens seemed to be done in the streets, and never 
 ceased, for, as we soon experienced, it went on all night, so that at first 
 we could not sleep for the continued row. We were amused, too, by the 
 exaggerated appearances of liberty, for shortly before there had been a 
 revolution in Naples, and so we found ourselves in the midst of a con- 
 stitutional government, with the people intoxicated and almost crazy with 
 their unwonted liberty, which was, however, of the most gingerbread 
 kind, or rather all gilt and no gingerbread. The King had sworn fealty 
 
62 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 to the new Constitution, but at the same time had secretly intrigued with 
 the Austrians. Two days after we landed, the perjured tyrant, called His 
 Majesty, escaped in an English man-of-war and got safe to Vienna, so the 
 Neapolitans were left in the lurch. On the afternoon of the same day we 
 came ashore we saw a grand review of the Neapolitan troops. The men 
 had a fine martial appearance I thought, but Keats would not allow that 
 they had any backbone in them, and ere long events proved how right 
 he was." 
 
 That night, at the Hotel d' Inghilterra, both were very 
 fatigued after their exciting day, though Keats yielded 
 also to a profound dejection. There is something drama- 
 tically affecting in the contrast between the joyous pictures, 
 outlined by Severn . and the bitter wretchedness of spirit 
 shown by Keats in the letter he wrote that night to hi& 
 friend Brown, his sole confidant in that cankerous trouble 
 which was eating away his life. Severn, also wrote home, 
 heading his letter simply " Naples. November 1st." It 
 was addressed to his sister Maria, and contained little beside 
 the following : — 
 
 " I have arrived here in perfect health, much of it gained in this sea- 
 voyage. I have been frequently sea-sick, but it has done me much good, 
 Improved my appetite and given me strength. Oh ! that I could say all 
 this of poor Keats. He suffered most severely ; many times I expected 
 him to die ; but at present in this city he is better — most certainly there 
 is hope of his recovery. I still think to bring him back well. It is a 
 source of the greatest consolation that I am with him." 
 
 "While Severn was writing that " certainly there was hope 
 of Keats's recovery, and that he was somewhat better," 
 his friend was sitting in an adjoining room, overcome by 
 physical weakness and sore distraught by bitter anguish of 
 mind and heart. In burning words he wrote to Brown, not 
 about his late pleasant experiences or the new and wonderful 
 ci'ty in which he was for the first time, but about his 
 ruining love and all the disastrous end of his brief dream 
 of happiness : — 
 
 " I can bear to die — I cannot bear to leave her. . . . Oh, God ! God \ 
 God ! Everything I have in my trunks that reminds me of her goes 
 through me like a spear. The silk lining that she put in my travelling- 
 cap scalds my head. My imagination is horribly vivid about her — I see 
 her. ... I hear her. . . . Oh, Brown, I have coals of fire in my breast. 
 It surprises me that the human heart is capable of so much misery." 
 
KEATS' S INDIGNATION IN NAPLES. G3 
 
 Keats — to return to Severn's record — 
 
 "was but so-so, and scarcely strong enough to go about, but yet bo 
 picked up for awhile with the excitement all around us. In the morning 
 we strolled about, and later on I went out by myself, and, I remember, 
 stood waiting at one place in order to see the King pass. When he 
 came I was dismayed, for he had the face of a goat, and I said to myself, 
 ' if ever I might have to do with legislation I'd make a law that 
 sovereigns should be good-looking people at least.' The sight of this 
 King Ferdinand — Bomba, as he was called in mockery — with his goat's 
 countenance, let down my loyalty fifty degrees. He was true to his 
 countenance, for, as I have already said, he stole away the following day, 
 and notwithstanding his most solemn oath to the Constitution, played 
 the part of a traitor. He had waited till he had received the Pope's 
 absolution, and then went over without shame to his country's enemies, 
 the Austrians. There was silence in Naples on the morrow when it was 
 first discovered that the King had fled, and that the people were betrayed. 
 
 " We went that evening to the San Carlo Theatre, and much admired 
 the fine scene-painting, though the singing was not good, and the acting 
 indifferent. We were particularly struck by the admirable painting or 
 ilever representation of two sentinels on the stage, one at either side. 
 To our astonishment — an amazement which gave way to indignation — 
 we saw, at the end of the act, the painted sentries became suddenly 
 animated and move about. They were, in fact, real men, and such was 
 the debasement of the Neapolitan national character that this outrage 
 was actually permitted to 'pass without indignant challenge. This gross 
 instance of tyrannical despotism was more than either of us could stand, 
 so we rose and forthwith left — though not till Keats had exclaimed in a 
 irenzy, 'Severn, we'll go on at once to Eome, for as I know that I shall 
 not" last long, it would make me die in anguish if I thought I was to 
 be buried amid a people with such miserable political [debasement?]/ 
 Next morning he received a letter from Shelley, then in Pisa, urging 
 uim to come northward, and be the guest of him and his wife ; a most 
 generous letter, and the second he had received from that fine poet and 
 noble man. But our plans were already fixed, and all our arrange- 
 ments made for an immediate departure for Rome. Before we left Naples 
 Mr. Cotterell would have a farewell dinner-party for us. Poor Keats made 
 a special effort and was very entertaining ; and he did not appear to 
 -uffer much. All the time we were at the Hotel d' Inghilterra he read 
 'Clarissa Harlowe,' in nine volumes I remember, and finished it just 
 before our departure. 
 
 " Next day * we were on our way to Eome. The journey was made in 
 
 * Severn says " next day," but it is not clear whether he means the 
 1th or the 5th. The context indicates the 4th ; but probably they left 
 early on the 5th. With his customary heedlessness as to dates, Severn in 
 one place specifies the date as 31st October — the day before they were free 
 from quarantine. 
 
•64 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 a small ,vettura (carriage), and iu many respects was pleasant, though 
 the roads were bad, and the accommodation at the wayside inns 
 villainously coarse and unpalatable, from which Keats naturally suffered 
 much more than I did. The season was delightful, and as the carriage did 
 little more than crawl along, I was able to walk nearly the whole way, 
 and at frequent intervals delighted Keats by gathering the wild flowers 
 which in some parts grew in profusion. The scenery, always near the 
 sea, combined with the pure air, was most exhilarating, the former not 
 only in its novelty, but in richness of colour and freshness at the same 
 time. I gained strength by my pedestrian trip, and got to Rome con- 
 siderably stronger than when I left England. Keats, on the other hand, 
 had become very listless, and seldom seemed even relatively happy, except 
 when an unusually fine prospect opened before us, or the breeze bore to 
 us exquisite hill fragrances or breaths from the distant blue seas, and 
 particularly when I literally filled the little carriage with flowers. He 
 never tired of these, and they gave him a singular and almost fantastic 
 pleasure that was at times almost akin to a strange joy. But there was 
 nothing sufficiently out of the common to impress us till we reached the 
 Campagna, whose vast billowy wastes, Keats said, were like an inland 
 ocean, only more monotonous than that we had lately left. Soon after we 
 had entered the Campagna, my attention was attracted by a large crimson 
 cloak, and on approaching nearer I discovered it to be around no less a 
 dignitary than a cardinal, engaged in what seemed to us the extra- 
 ordinary sport of shooting small birds. He had an owl tied loosely to a 
 stick, and a small looking-glass was annexed to move about with the owl, 
 the light of which attracted numerous birds. The whole merit of this 
 sport seemed to be in not shooting the owl. Two footmen in livery kept 
 loading the fowling-pieces for the cardinal, and it was astonishing the 
 great number of birds he killed. At last we came within view of Rome, 
 a memorable sight in its grandeur and seeming deserted solitariness. As 
 we drew nearer it became evident that we were approaching a great town 
 of the living. We were both much excited as well as impressed by the 
 absolutely unique environment of the Eternal City; and it was indeed an 
 eventful moment. We entered Rome by the Lateran Gate, and almost 
 immediately came upon the Colosseum, superb in its stupendous size and 
 rugged grandeur of outline. It is the best way to approach and enter 
 Rome, and far more striking than the route from the north — at least, such 
 was the effect on my mind, an effect never since erased or diminished by 
 all I have seen. Naturally, there was more to interest us in Rome than 
 in Naples, but the sight that, in the circumstances, was the most welcome 
 of all, was the genial face of the eminent physician Sir James Clark, or 
 rather, as he then was, plain Dr. Clark. Keats had had a special 
 letter of recommendation to him, and had written from the Maria 
 Crowther, just before we were out of quarantine, apprising him of his 
 arrival, and again from Naples just before we left that city, and the 
 excellent doctor had already taken an apartment for him on the first floor 
 of the house on the right hand of the steps leading up from the Piazzi di 
 
KEATS AND SEVERN IN SOME. 65 
 
 Spagna to the church of Santa Trinita dei Monti. This had the great 
 advantage not only of good situation, but of being opposite to the 
 physician's own house, -which, indeed, was a pre-arrangement, so that 
 Dr. Clark might have his patient near at all hours. We both found 
 accommodation in the same house, and Keats's bedroom was the one 
 which looked over the steps on the side of the house. 
 
 " To be in Rome with Keats was in itself an event, independent of 
 Rome and all it meant for me ; for at last there seemed a chance of his 
 being saved, and his restoration in so famed a place would surely secure 
 his recovery. But the good doctor also thought of me, when he heard 
 that I knew no one and had introductions to none, except that of Sir 
 Thomas Lawrence to Canova. He went and spoke of me to John Gibson, 
 the great sculptor ; and poor dear Keats, though at the moment he could 
 ill spare me, insisted on my going straight to Gibson's studio. On my 
 arrival I found a great man, the eminent connoisseur Lord Colchester, just 
 entering, and so I thought it expedient to retire ; but Gibson caught me 
 by the arm and insisted on my entering along with my lord. Throughout 
 the visit and during inspection of his works, he showed me the same 
 attention as he did to Lord Colchester, and I was so much struck by this 
 generous consideration towards a poor and unknown young artist like 
 myself, that I thought, ' if Gibson, who is a great artist, can afford to do 
 such a thing as thisj then Rome is the place for me.' Indeed, the act, 
 slight as it may seem, was like sunshine to me ; it was literally a revela- 
 tion, for as the profession of Art in London was, in my experience, limited 
 to the making of money, so my little career had been very painful, for I 
 had not then, and have never since had, the power of uniting trade and 
 Art to the advantage of the former. On my return Keats was delighted 
 with this first ' treat to humanity,' as he called it, and discussed the plans 
 he had devised for me during my sojourn. To start with, he wanted me 
 to begin at once upon a picture, to commence that very day with at least 
 a sketch, particularly as I treasured some hope of a chance of the Royal 
 Academy's granting me the three years' pension of travelling-student, of 
 which the unfavourable aspect was that I had already got to Rome on my 
 own account, and, as Keats suggested, I might thereby have offended the 
 touchy pride of the Council. It required a greater amount of prudence 
 than I possessed to make a too obvious clutch at the pension. Keats then 
 told me confidentially some of his reasons for thinking that my chances 
 were very slight. One was that my having obtained the gold medal after 
 it had been withheld so many years had created such an amount of envy 
 and even malice against me that I had to fight against a host of tradesmen 
 in Art. He recounted his being at a dinner with Hilton and some other 
 artists at the house of Hilton's brother-in-law, and the subject of conver- 
 sation was the Royal Academy's having given me the long unawarded 
 gold medal. Some one scornfully explained that the picture was very 
 inferior, but that as the artist was an old fellow, and had made frequent 
 attempts for the prize, the Council had given the medal out of pity and 
 not for any merit. Keats, after a few moments, expressed his disgust at 
 
66 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 such a mean lie, having first awaited a flat contradiction from one of the 
 three artists present besides Hilton, who knew it to be a lie ; and he 
 declared that he would not any longer sit at the same table with such 
 traducers and snobs; that he knew me intimately, had seen my picture 
 and recognised its merits ; that, as they well knew, I was a young man, 
 and that the picture was my first attempt for a prize of any kind. He 
 then rose from the .table and abruptly left the party. This fact he had 
 not communicated to me before, he said, from the fear that it might 
 disturb me and lead me astray. But now, he urged, it was most 
 expedient that I should lose no time in contending with my artistic 
 enemies, and to confront them before they could do me further harm. 
 He became much excited as he recounted this villainy, for with his ready 
 sympathy he placed himself in my position. Although small of stature, 
 yet on these occasions of acts of meanness, he seemed to rise to a larger 
 stature, and the effect was a marvellous contrast to his charming manner 
 when he was tranquil. Tet though thus ever ready to speak of my 
 small worries, he said little of his own. While in Italy he always shrank 
 from speaking in direct terms of the actual things which were killing 
 him. Certainly the ' Blackwood's ' attack was one of the least of his 
 miseries, for he never even mentioned it to me. The greater trouble 
 which was engulfing him he signified in a hundred ways. Was it to be 
 wondered at that at the time when the happiest life was presented to his 
 view, when it was arranged that he was to marry a young person of 
 beauty and fortune, when the little knot of friends who valued him and 
 believed in a future for the beloved poet, and he himself, with generous, 
 unselfish feelings, looked forward to it more delighted on their account — 
 was it to be wondered at that, on the appearance of consumption, his 
 ardent mind should have sunk into despair? He seemed struck down 
 from the highest happiness to the lowest misery. He felt crushed at the 
 prospect of being cut off at the early age of twenty-four, when the cup 
 was at his lips, and he was beginning to drink that cup of delight which 
 was to last his mortal life through, which would have insured to him 
 the happiness of home — happiness he had never felt, for he was an 
 orphan, and which would be a barrier for him against a cold and (to him) 
 a malignant world." 
 
 Earlier, in the article which he entitled ' The Vicissitudes 
 of Keats' s Fame,' he wrote : 
 
 " Now that I am reviewing all the progress of his illness, from his first 
 symptoms, I cannot but think his life might have been preserved by an 
 Italian sojourn, if it had been adopted in time, and if circumstances had 
 been improved as they presented themselves. And, indeed, if he had 
 had the further good fortune to go to America, which he partly con- 
 templated before the death of his younger brother, not only would his life 
 and health have been preserved, but his early fame have been insured. 
 He would have lived independent of the London world, which was 
 
THEIR EARLY LIFE IN ROME. 67 
 
 striving to drag him down in his poetic career, and adding to the sufferings 
 which I consider one of the immediate causes of his early death." 
 
 On Keats's urgent request, Severn agreed to go on with 
 his art-work in such leisure as he could command. 
 
 " I proceeded forthwith," he says, " to make the sketch of the ' Death of 
 Alcibiades.' Keats continued to be anguished on my account, for he knew 
 as well as I that my prospects in great measure depended on my 
 producing another picture in competition for the student's pension ; but 
 with my agitation for the poor fellow it seemed impossible that I could 
 execute such a work for such a purpose, in what were then my circum- 
 stances. Nevertheless it was a great consolation to Keats to see that I 
 was building up the • Alcibiades.' About this time he expressed a strong 
 desire that we had a pianoforte, so that I might play to him, for not only 
 was he passionately fond of music, but found that his constant pain and 
 o'erfretted nerves were much soothed by it. This I managed to obtain on 
 loan, and Dr. Clark procured me many volumes and pieces of music, and 
 Keats had thus a welcome solace in the dreary hours he had to pass. 
 Among the volumes was one of Haydn's Symphonies, and these were his 
 delight, and he would exclaim enthusiastically, ' This Haydn is like a 
 child, for there is no knowing what he will do next.' 
 
 " In our first Eoman days we got very odd and bad dinners sent in, as 
 the Eoman custom is, from a Trattoria, or restaurant. This was the 
 more intolerable as we paid a crown for each meal, and as each, for all 
 their cunning disguises in sauces and spices, was more unpalatable than 
 the other. We put up with this annoyance for more than a week, 
 although we made daily complaints to the padrona di casa, but one day 
 we both pronounced the dinner to be unfit to eat. Keats hit on an 
 expedient by which we always got good dinners afterwards. He would 
 not tell me what it was to be. When the porter came as usual with the 
 basket, and was beginning to set out the dinner, Keats stepped forward, 
 and smiling roguishly at me, with a 'Now, Severn, you'll see it,' he 
 opened the window, which was over the front steps, and taking up each 
 dish one after the other he quietly emptied the contents out of the window 
 and returned the plate to the basket — and thus disappeared a fowl, a rice 
 pudding, cauliflower, a dish of macaroni, &c. This was all done to the 
 amusement of the porter and the padrona. He then quietly but very 
 decidedly pointed to the basket for the porter to take away, which he did 
 without demur. ' Now,' said Keats, ' you'll see, Severn, that we'll have a 
 decent dinner ; ' and sure enough in less than half-an-hour an excellent 
 one came, and we continued to be similarly well treated every day. In 
 the account, moreover, the padrona was discreet enough not to charge for 
 the dinners thrown out of the window." 
 
 Slowly, but, as Severn thought, surely, Keats seemed to 
 improve in health ; and though he was forbidden to go to 
 
 f 2 
 
68 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 the Colosseum, or indeed to indulge in any sight-seeing, he 
 sauntered along the Corso to the Porta del Popolo, or 
 rested upon the upper terrace of the " Spanish Stairs," or 
 lounged among the olives and ilexes upon the Pincio. He 
 himself thought that there was at least a more definite 
 chance for him, or at least he pretended that there was the 
 shadow of a hope ; and Severn joyfully wrote to common 
 friends in England that they might reasonably expect 
 further encouraging news. So with a lighter heart the 
 young artist betook himself to the Colosseum, the Palace of 
 the Caesars, and elsewhere, to sketch the ruins, or to the 
 Vatican Galleries — and particularly, at last, to study " at 
 the feet of Michael Angelo." Keats, on his part, not only 
 read a good deal in English, and studied Italian (with such 
 nimbleness and industry that he could soon read with some 
 enjoyment), but began to dream of again taking up the pen 
 and of writing a long poem upon the story of Sabrina. He 
 was, even in this short-lived rally, subject to swift moods of 
 dejection — to moments, rather, when the phantoms he strove 
 to keep at bay suddenly sprang forth from the wayside 
 coverts where they lurked, and overcame him. Severn has 
 recorded one such episode, when he tells how Keats began 
 to read a volume of poems by Alfieri, but could read no- 
 more, and threw the book away, when he came to the 
 following words, with their, for him, too poignant signi- 
 ficance : — 
 
 " Misera me ! sollievo a me non resta 
 Altro che '1 pianto, ed il pianto e delitto." 
 
 But this Indian summer of the poet's life was destined to 
 be pathetically brief. In a few weeks after his arrival in 
 Koine a serious relapse happened, and the invalid sank at 
 once from a condition of promise to the very frontiers of 
 death. Terrible haemorrhages led to a fierce wasting fever, 
 and the fever and renewed haemorrhages to a deathly 
 weakness. 
 
 " Dr. Clark was very kind and considerate, and was most ardent in his 
 attention on Keats, and at times arose in the night to watch him, when 
 any serious change took place or seemed imminent. This bitterly painful 
 
KEATS' S BEL APSE. 69 
 
 position for me (and bo it was in a high degree, when nothing seemed to 
 help my unfortunate friend) was not without a redeeming point — I mean 
 that it was not utter misery, for I was at least the nurse of Keats, 
 however unworthy and whatever my deficiencies ; and, moreover, I was 
 sustained by the delightful hope of my beloved friend's recovery, if God so 
 willed. This hope reconciled me to every difficulty and supplied the 
 place of sleep at times, and even food, for I was obliged to devote myself 
 wholly to him both day and night, as his nervous state would not admit 
 of his seeing any one but Dr. Clark and myself. And yet, with all his 
 suffering and consciousness of approaching death, he never quite lost the 
 play of his cheerful and elastic mind. Yet these happier moments were 
 but slight snatches from his misery, like the flickering rays of the sun in 
 a smothering storm. Real rays of sunshine they were, all the same, such 
 as would have done honour to the brightest health and happiest mind : 
 yet the storm of sickness and death was always going on, and I have 
 often thought that these bursts of wit and cheerfulness were called up o 
 set purpose — were, in fact, a great effort on my account. I could perceive 
 in many ways that he was always painfully alive to my situation, wholly 
 dependent as I was upon my painting. His wit, I should add, was 
 seldom exercised but upon unpleasant things, for he was essentially 
 chivalrous and tender-hearted; and, too, it never failed to call up 
 something pleasant." 
 
 On December 14th, four days after the disastrous collapse, 
 Severn wrote to Mrs. Brawne : 
 
 " My dear Mauam, 
 
 " 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 
 that you should know the truth ; yet I dare not let him see I think his 
 state dangerous. On the morning of this attack he was going on in good 
 spirits quite merrily, when, in an instant, a cough seized him, and he 
 vomited two cupfuls 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 
 
70 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 talk him into a liltle 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 he 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. Oh ! he will mourn over all to 
 me whilst I cool his burning forehead, till I tremble for his intellect. 
 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 Eome 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. 
 Those 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 good night." 
 
LETTER FROM HASLAM ABOUT KEATS. 71 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Letter from Haslam about Keats — Letters from Haslam and Charles 
 Armitage Brown — Miss Brawne and Keats — Letter to Mrs. Brawne — 
 Keats's mortal illness^A brief rally — Severn's death-bed portrait of 
 Keats — " He for his death : and I for his life " — Leigh Hunt's letter 
 about Keats — Long Jetter to Mrs. Brawne — Keats's last days — Letter 
 to Haslam — Death of Keats — His burial — Severn's many troubles — 
 Miss Brawne and Keats's death — Notable letters from Brown and Mr. 
 Taylor — Preparations for a biography — Keats's will — Severn after 
 Keats's death. 
 
 It was not till after Christmas — " the strangest and 
 saddest, yet not altogether the least happy I had ever 
 spent " — that Severn was able to write home, and then but 
 a brief note, addressed to his sister Maria. After some 
 remarks on the journey from Naples to Rome, with an " old 
 England for ever " chorus throughout, he adds : 
 
 "Yet I can but little judge, for I never leave my friend Keats. He 
 continues in this last attack so bad that I fear he never can recover. 'Tis 
 nearly three weeks since his relapse, and yet no signs of recovery. He 
 has kept in bed all this time, nor dares move, from the fear of the blood- 
 vessels on his lungs breaking out again. His suffering is great. He 
 wishes night after night he may die, for if he recovers from his present 
 attack he must yet succumb to consumption. Heaven look down upon 
 
 him I am finishing a journal of our voyage so that you shall have 
 
 every particular, and I will try to send you my picture. The treatment 
 we meet with here is very kind, that is, from the English." 
 
 It was during the most trying period of Keats's relapse, 
 when he faintly rallied from the edge of the grave and then 
 slid slowly backward, and so alternately hovered between 
 life and death, that Severn had the pleasure of hearing from 
 William Haslam in England.* It is a pathetic revelation 
 of how deep was the feeling entertained towards Keats by 
 his friends. The letter, moreover, affords a somewhat 
 
 * Severn had written to Haslam from the Maria Growtlier, and posted 
 the first or second day after entering Naples. 
 
72 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 amusing insight into Severn's character, as viewed by one 
 of his early friends. 
 
 "■Greenwich, 
 
 " 4th Dec, 1820. 
 " My deae Severn, 
 
 "Your letter from shipboard when under quarantine gave me an 
 extent of anxiety such as my heart hath not known since I parted with 
 Keats at Gravesend. It hung about me intensely for days, and at nights 
 I dreamt of you, but I did not, could not, show it to a soul. I could not 
 bring myself to give occasion to that grief to any man that the perusal 
 had forced on me. Do not, however, mention in any of your letters home 
 that I have acknowledged the receipt of a letter of that date, for altho' I 
 should not forgive myself if I had shown it — still friends will not acquit 
 one — for that I did not show it, but I hoped you would write, and you 
 ought, Severn, to have written within three days again. Why have you 
 not kept your diary ? I ask you solemnly, for no one thing on earth can 
 give such satisfaction at home as such minute detail as you set out with. 
 If you have discontinued it, in God's name resume it, and send it regularly 
 to me, only that, however, I may see fit to circulate it. I will zealously 
 preserve each section (number each, or letter it, that I may do this un- 
 erringly, and write on tank post paper), so that you may possess the 
 entire diary whenever you call upon me for it. Do this, Severn, tho' at 
 some sacrifice of your inherent dislike of order and of obligation to do a 
 thing^do it, if but because I ask it. 
 
 " Your letter came to me but last Friday (to-day is Monday, and our 
 mail goes out to-morrow) ; you will hardly think that the receipt of it 
 relieved me, and yet, sorrowful as are its contents, it did, so deeply had 
 the letter of which I have been speaking distressed me — ' that Keats this 
 morning made an Italian pun ; ' these, Severn, are the things that do 
 one's heart good. ' Water parted from the sea,' was another of them. 
 But, the fact of the return of Keats's spitting of blood stands ! and yet I 
 did not but expect the voyage would have the effect of inducing its return ; 
 the climate, however, will, I trust, avail him. Keep him quiet, get the 
 winter through ; an opening year in Italy will perfect everything. Ere 
 this reaches you, I trust Doctor Clark will have confirmed the most 
 sanguine hopes of his friends in England ; and to you, my friend, I hope 
 he will have given what you stand much in need of — a confidence amount- 
 ing to a faith. Study to gain this, Severn, for trust me, that much, very 
 much with invalids depends upon the countenances of those about them. 
 Omit no opportunities that present themselves to induce Keats to dis- 
 burthen his mind to you. I know (tho' since he left England it has come to 
 my knowledge) that he has much upon it. Avoid speaking of George to him. 
 George is a scoundrel ! but talk of his friends in England, of their love, their 
 hopes of him.* Keats must get himself well again, Severn, if but for us. 
 
 _ * Haslam wrote this remark about George Keats under a misapprehen- 
 sion. He and Charles Brown were always harsh in their judgments of 
 
LETTERS FROM IIASLAM AND BROWN. 73 
 
 I, for one, cannot afford to lose him. If I know what it is to love, I truly love 
 John Keats. I sent your letter (the last) to Brown. Brown read it, with 
 omissions and additions, next door, and returned it to me to-day. I send 
 by this post a letter from Brown to Keats, sent to me on Saturday before 
 he saw the last-mentioned, also one from your sister Maria, who called and 
 left it with me to-day. Your family, she tells me, are all well. Tom has 
 several times called on me, and I understand your father has at last 
 become tolerably reconciled. I continue miserably oppressed, I mean as 
 regards my executorship ; 'tis now near three o'clock that I am closing 
 this for you. My wife and child are well, and I, at least in them, am 
 happy. 
 
 f " Your attached friend, 
 
 "Wm. Haslam." 
 
 But while the friends in England, who had been alarmed 
 by the first news that had come home, were gratified by a 
 more hopeful letter which Keats wrote to Brown on the 
 30th of November, some eight or ten days before his relapse 
 ■began, and when he was slowly gaining strength and almost 
 hope, the poet was lying in what nearly proved the pains of 
 dissolution. Unaware of Keats's evil plight Brown wrote 
 the following cheery letter immediately after receipt of the 
 welcome note from Borne, which reached the invalid during 
 his last deceptive rally, and brought a look of pleasure to 
 his face for the rest of the day. It is addressed to " John 
 Keats, Esq., Poste Bestante, Borne." 
 
 " Hampstead, 
 
 " 21st Dec, 1820. 
 " My dear Keats, 
 
 "Not two hours since your letter from Borne, dated 30th Nov., 
 came to me, and as to-morrow is post-night, you shall have the answer in 
 •due course. And so you still wish me to follow you to Borne ? and truly 
 I wish to go ; nothing detains me but prudence. Little could be gained, 
 if anything, by letting my house at this time of the year, and the con- 
 .sequence would be a heavy additional expense which I cannot possibly 
 afford, unless it were a matter of necessity, and I see none while you are 
 in such good hands as Severn's. As for my appropriating any part of 
 remittances from George, that is out of the question, while you continue 
 •disabled from writing. Thank God, you are getting better ! Your last 
 letter, which I so gravely answered about 4th Dec, showed how much 
 
 their friend's brother. It is not easy to discover the truth. But the 
 unbiassed reader will note that Brown to the last maintained his point, 
 -und that whereas he had certain puzzling documents and facts, Dilke had 
 nothing save asseverations. 
 
74 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 you had suffered by the voyage and the cursed quarantine. Keep your 
 mind easy, my dear fellow, and no fear of your body. Your sister, I hear, 
 is in remarkably good health. The last news from George (already given 
 to you) was so far favourable that there were no complaints. Everybody 
 next door is quite well. Taylor has just returned to town. I saw him 
 for a few minutes the other day, and had not time to put some questions 
 which I wished, but I understand your poems increase in sale. Hunt has 
 been very ill, but is now recovered. All other friends are well. I know 
 you don't like John Scott, but he is doing a thing that tickles me to the 
 heart's core, and you will like to hear of it, if you have any revenge in 
 your composition. By some means (crooked enough I dare say), he has got 
 possession of one of ' Blackwood's ' gang, who has turned king's evidence, 
 and month' after month he belabours them with the most damning facts 
 that can be conceived; if they are indeed facts, I know not how the 
 rogues can stand up against them. This virulent attack has made me 
 like the ' London Magazine,' and I sent the first chapter of my tour for 
 Scott to publish, if he would pay me ten guineas per sheet, and print the 
 whole chapters monthly, without my forfeiting the copyright in the end. 
 This would have answered my purpose famously, but he won't agree to 
 my stipulations. He praises my writing wondrously, will pay the ten 
 guineas, and so on ; but the fellow forsooth must have the chapters some- 
 what converted into the usual style of magazine articles, and so the treaty 
 
 is at end I dined with liichards on his wedding-day — he had just 
 
 recovered from breaking his leg. How could he be so brittle ? And it 
 was done in a game of romps with his children ! Now, I've something to 
 make you ' spit fire, spout flame.' The batch of brag-players asked me 
 to town, hoping to fleece me ; it was at Reynolds' lodging, and I carried 
 off £2 10s. When will they be sick of these vain attempts ? Mrs. Dilke 
 was next door yesterday; she had a sad tumble in the mud (you must 
 not laugh). Her news was that Martin is to be married this year ; that 
 Reynolds and Mrs. Montagu correspond sentimentally, and that Barry 
 Cornwall is to have Miss Montagu. There's some interesting small-talk 
 
 for you. Oh ! Barry C had a tragedy coming forth at the theatre, 
 
 christened Mirandola — Mire and la ! What an odd being you are : 
 because you and I were so near meeting twice, yet missed each other 
 both times, you cry out 'there was my star predominant;' why not 
 mine (0. B.'s) as well ? But this is the way you argue yourself into fits, 
 of the spleen. If I were in Severn's place, and you insisted on ever 
 gnawing a bone, I'd lead you the life of a dog. What the devil 
 should you grumble for ? Do you recollect my anagram on your name ? 
 How pat it comes now to Severn ! My love to him and the said 
 anagram, ' Thanks Joe !' If I have a right guess, a certain person 
 next door is a little disappointed at not receiving a letter from you, 
 but not a word has dropped. She wrote to you lately, and so did your 
 sister. 
 
 " Yours most faithfully, 
 
 " Chas. Brows.'* 
 
MISS BEAWNE AND KEATS. 75 
 
 Some three weeks later, after Brown had heard of the 
 disastrous relapse following so suddenly upon the improve- 
 ment, he wrote to Severn in a very different strain. The 
 letter, notwithstanding its exaggerated language against 
 George Keats, indicates what deep feeling " the exuberant 
 Brown " could show. It is satisfactory to know that in the 
 course of time George Keats was found guiltless of any 
 fraud, at any rate by all save two of his acquaintances. 
 
 " Your letter of 17th December arrived here last Tuesday, the 9th. 
 I cannot dwell on the subject of it. Either I am shortly to receive more 
 favourable accounts, or to suffer the bitterest news. I feel — and I 
 cannot help it — all your attentions to my unhappy Keats as if they were 
 shown to myself, — yet how difficult I have found it to return you thanks, 
 until this morning it has been utterly out of my power to write on so 
 melancholy a story. He is present to me everywhere and at all times — 
 he now seems sitting by my side and looking hard in my face, though I 
 have taken the opportunity of writing this in company — for I scarcely 
 believe I could do it alone. Much as I have. loved him, I never knew 
 how closely he was wound about my heart. Mrs. Brawne was greatly 
 
 agitated when I told her of and her daughter I don't know 
 
 how — for I was not present — yet she bears it with great firmness, mourn- 
 fully but without affectation. I understand she says to his mother, ' I 
 believe he must soon die, and when you hear of his death, tell me 
 immediately. I am not a fool ! ' 
 
 " Poor girl ! she does not know how desolate her heart will be when 
 she learns there is no hope, and how wretched she will feel, without being 
 a fool. The only hope I have rests on Dr. Clark not considering the 
 case in so gloomy a light as you do — for his kindness ask him to receive 
 a stranger's thanks. But you and I well know poor Keats's disease is in 
 the mind ; he is dying broken-hearted. You know much of his grief, but 
 do you know how George has treated him ? I sit planning schemes of 
 vengeance upon his head. Should his brother die, exposure and infamy 
 shall consign him to perpetual exile. I will have no mercy ; the world 
 will cry aloud for the cause of Keats's untimely death, and I will give 
 it. Severn, nothing on my part could stop that cruel brother's hand 
 — indeed I knew not, till after he quitted us the second time for 
 America, how cruel he had been. I have already written to him. Not 
 a penny remitted yet! not a word in excuse for not remitting! I 
 authorise you to open my letters to Keats ; if he is still alive, you may 
 perhaps cull something to cheer him, if not it is no matter, but take care 
 you do not open a letter with my handwriting on the address which 
 contains another handwriting ; there is such a letter, and you can avoid 
 opening it by peeping inside. I hear your family are well, but I suppose 
 you are by this time satisfied on that score. Take care of your own 
 
76 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 health. While attending a sick-bed, I know by experience, we can 
 bear up for a long, long time, but in the end we feel it severely. God 
 "bless you ! 
 
 " Yours sincerely, 
 
 "Charles Brown." 
 
 A fortnight later Brown wrote again, having heard from 
 ■George Keats. He is still as embittered against the latter, 
 though less rhetorical in his denunciations. 
 
 "This morning a letter from Mr. George Keats, dated Louisville, 
 November 8th, addressed to Keats, arrived. I took the liberty of opening 
 it, for it might have contained notice of a present remittance. It, how- 
 ever, does not, though he says, ' I hope to be able to send you money 
 soon.' As for the rest, he writes very cheeringly; everyone is in good 
 health, and there is this sentence, ' By next autumn I hope to live in a 
 house and on ground of my own, with returns at least three times my 
 expenses ; my gain now is double my expenses,' It appears the only 
 hindrance against remitting is a perverse want of the circulating medium. 
 Tell Keats all this. As for the remainder of the letter, it is full of happy 
 prospects and good hopes. , So far, my dear Severn, you may read to our 
 poor friend, if yet alive ; it may do him more good than anything else. 
 Though the above extracts are really culled from the Louisville letter, and 
 though the whole of it is composed of the kindest expressions, my opinion 
 of the writer remains unaltered. He is a canting, selfish, heartless 
 swindler, and shall have to answer for the death of his brother, if it must 
 be so. Three days since we heard, by a letter from Dr. Clark to one of 
 his friends, that there was no hope and no fear of a lingering illness. I 
 have no complaint except in my indignant feelings against Mr. G. 
 Keats— they keep me up. Miss Brawne does not actually know there is 
 no hope, she looks more sad every day. She has insisted on writing to 
 him by this post, take care of the letter — if too late, let it be returned 
 unopened (together with the one with my handwriting on the address and 
 hers inside) to Mrs. Brawne. God bless you ! take care of your own 
 health — so much do I feel for your kindness towards Keats, that I cannot 
 boar the thought of your being a sufferer by it, and therefore regret I did 
 not, at all hazards, and in spite of apparent difficulties, follow you both 
 to Italy, and relieve you in your distressing attentions. 
 
 " Yours truly and affectionately, 
 
 " Charles Brown." 
 
 Keats's rally in January partially deceived Mrs. and Miss 
 Brawne as well as Severn. The latter, thankful to have 
 good news to communicate, wrote hopefully, and even 
 hinted at the prospect of accompanying Keats back to 
 England in the summer. It is difficult to understand 
 
LETTER TO MRS. BRAWNE. 77 
 
 Severn's exact intention in this matter, for he must have 
 known how irrecoverable was his friend's health. Even 
 had he been blind to the almost unmistakable heralds of 
 death, and deaf to Keats's own calmly judicial survey of his 
 case, Dr. Clark had already made it clear that the end was 
 inevitable, however delayed by the slow surrender of a 
 strenuous life battliug to the last. Possibly he thought it 
 kindest to give Miss Brawne some shadowy hope as long as 
 possible, or he may really have conceived the possibility of 
 the invalid holding out for many months, long enough to 
 die at home and more happily than in a remote and alien 
 city. Hope annihilated is perhaps better than hope tortured 
 in a slow, lingering death, with heart-sickening fluctuations ; 
 yet even tortured hope is hope, and it may be that the 
 letter by which Severn slightly lightened the grief of Keats's 
 " widowing love," was the best that could be written. 
 
 " Rome, 
 " Jan. 11th, 1821. 1 o'clock morning, (finished 3 a.m.) 
 " My dear Madam, 
 
 " I said that ' the first good news I had should be for the kind 
 Mrs. Brawne.' I ani thankful and delighted to make good my promise, 
 to be able at all to do it, for amid all the horrors hovering over poor Keats 
 this was the most dreadful —that I could see no possible way, and but 
 a fallacious hope for his recovery ; but now, thank God, I have a real one. 
 I most certainly "think I shall bring him back to England — at least my 
 anxiety for his recovery and comfort made me think this — for half the 
 cause of bis danger has arisen for the loss of England, from the dread of 
 never seeing it more. ! this hung upon him like a torture : never may 
 I behold the sight again, even in my direst enemy. Little did I think 
 what a task of affliction and danger I had undertaken, for I thought only 
 of the beautiful mind of Keats, my attachment to him, and his conva- 
 lescence. But I will tell you, dear madam, the singular reasons I have for 
 hoping for his recovery. In the first fortnight of this attack his memory 
 presented to him everything that was dear and delightful, even to the 
 minutiae, and with it all the persecution, and I may say villainy, practised 
 upon him — his exquisite sensibility for everyone, save his poor self — all 
 his own means and comfort expended on others — almost in vain. These 
 he would contrast with his present suffering, and say that all was brought 
 on by them, and he was right. Now he has changed to calmness and 
 quietude, as singular as productive of good, for his mind was most 
 certainly killing him. He has now given up all thoughts, hopes, or even 
 wish for recovery. His mind is in a state of peace from the final leave he 
 
LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 has taken of this world and all its future hopes ; this has been an immense 
 weight for him to rise from. He remains quiet and submissive under his 
 heavy fate. Now, if anything will recover him, it is this absence of himself. 
 I have perceived for the last three days symptoms of recovery. Dr. 
 Clark even thinks so. Nature again revives in him— I mean where art 
 ■was used before ; yesterday he permitted me to carry him from his bed- 
 room to our sitting-room — to put clean things on him — and to talk about 
 my painting to him. This is my good news — don't think it otherwise, 
 my dear madam, for I have been in such a state of anxiety and discom- 
 fiture in this barbarous place, that the least hope of my friend's recovery 
 is a heaven to me. 
 
 " For three weeks I have never left him — I have sat up all night — I 
 have read to him nearly all day, and even in the night — I light, the fire — 
 make his breakfast, and sometimes am obliged to cook — make his bed, 
 and even sweep the room. I can have these things done, but never at the 
 lime when they must and ought to be done — so that you will see my 
 alternative ; what enrages me most is making a fire — I blow — blow for 
 an hour — the smoke comes fuming out — my kettle falls over on the 
 hurning sticks — no stove — Keats calling me to be with him — the fire 
 catching my hands and the door-bell ringing : all these to one quite 
 unused and not at all capable — with the want of even proper material — 
 come not a little galling. But to my great surprise I am not ill — or even 
 restless — nor have I been all the time; there is nothing but what I will 
 do for him — there is no alternative but what I think and provide myself 
 against — except his death — not the loss of him — I am prepared to bear 
 that — but the inhumanity, the barbarism of these Italians. So far I 
 have kept everything from poor Keats ; but if he did know but part what 
 I suffer from them and their cursed laws, it would kill him. Just to 
 instance one thing among many. News was brought me the other day 
 that our gentle landlady had reported to the police that my friend was 
 dying of consumption. Now their law is — that every individual thing, 
 even to the paper on the walls in each room the patient has been in, 
 shall without reserve be destroyed by fire, the loss to be made better than 
 good by his friends. This startled me not a little, for in our sitting-room 
 where I wanted to bring him, there is property worth about £150, besides 
 all our own books, &c. — invaluable. Now my difficulty was to shift him 
 to this room, and let no one know it. This was a heavy task from the 
 unfortunate manner of the place ; our landlady's apartments are on the 
 same floor with ours — her servant waits on me when it pleases her, and 
 enters from an adjoining room. 
 
 " I was determined on removing Keats, let what would be the conse- 
 quence. The change was most essential to his health and spirits, and the 
 following morning I set about accomplishing it. In the first place I 
 blocked up their door so as they could not enter, then made up a bed on 
 the sofa, and removed my friend to it. The greatest difficulty was in 
 keeping all from him; I succeeded in this too, by making his bed, 
 «nd sweeping the room where it is — and going dinnerless with all the 
 
KEATS' S MORTAL ILLNESS. 79 
 
 pretensions of dining, persuading him that their servant had made his 
 bed and I had been dining. He half suspected this, but as he could not 
 tell the why and the wherefore, there it ended. I got him back in the 
 afternoon, and no one save Dr. Clark knew about it. Dr. Clark still 
 attends him with his usual kindness, and shows his good heart in every- 
 thing he does; the like of his lady— I cannot tell which shows us the 
 most kindness. / even am a mark of their care — mince-pies and 
 numberless nice things come over to keep me alive. But for their kind- 
 ness I am afraid we should go on very gloomily. Now, my dear madam, 
 I must leave off — my eyes are beginning to be unruly, and I must write 
 a most important letter to our president, Sir Thomas Lawrence, before I 
 suffer myself to go to sleep. Will you be so kind as to write Mr. Taylor 
 that it was at Messrs. Torlonias' advice Mr. Keats drew a bill for the 
 whole sum £120 ? — this was to save the trouble and expense of many small 
 bills, he now draws in small sums. I have the whole of his affairs under 
 charge, and am trying the nearest possible way. Mr. Taylor will hear 
 from Dr. Clark about the bill ; it will be well arranged. 
 
 " Present my respectful compliments to Miss Brawne, who I hope and 
 trust is quite well. Now that I think of her, my mind is carried to your 
 happy Wentworth Place, where all that peaceful English comfort seems 
 to exist. ! I would my unfortunate friend had never left your Went- 
 worth Place — for the hopeless advantages of this comfortless Italy. He 
 has many, many times talked' over ' the few happy days at your house, 
 the only time when his mind was at ease.' I hope still to see him with 
 you again. Farewell, my dear madam. One more thing I must say — 
 poor Keats cannot see any letters, at least he will not — they affect him so 
 much and increase his danger. The two last I repented giving, he made 
 me put them into his box — unread ; more of these when I write again, 
 meanwhile any matter of moment had better come to me. I will be very 
 happy to receive advice and remembrance from you. Once more farewell. 
 " Your obedient and affectionate servant, 
 
 "Joseph Severn." 
 " 3 o'clock morning. 
 " P.S. — I have just looked at him — he is in a beautiful sleep ; in look he 
 is very much more like himself — I have the greatest [hope] of him " 
 
 Mrs. Brawne replied just as Keats's final death-agony had 
 begun : — 
 
 " Hainpstead, 
 
 '" February 6th, 1821. 
 " My dear Mr. Severn, > 
 
 "Tour letter afforded me great consolation, if it were only 
 hearing Mr. Keats was in a tranquil state of mind. , How much I feel for 
 you ! how unfortunate his being out of England ! l how happy should I 
 have been to have assisted you in nursing him ! After the distressing 
 accounts we have heard I scarcely dare have a hope of, his recovery, but 1 
 will trust to what you say. When you talk of bringing him to England 
 
80 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 it cheers us, for, believe me, I should consider it among the happiest- 
 moments of my life to see him here in better health. You do not say 
 whether he has a cough, which I fear he has. Your voyage, everything, 
 has been unfortunate ; the only comfort you have had has been in 
 meeting with kind friends in Dr. and Mrs. Clark, but we must hope for 
 better prospects. Mr. Keats has sincere friends in England who are 
 most anxious about him. Should he be recovering in the slightest degree, 
 entreat him for their sake to look forward, and not dwell upon the past, 
 as I feel assured it would add greatly toward it. I saw Mr. Haslam 
 last week ; he appears much distressed for Mr. Keats and yourself. I must 
 beg you to take care of your own health. Do not omit taking nourish- 
 ment, as it is absolutely necessary to support yourself during the fatigue of 
 body and mind under which you must be labouring. Mr. Taylor sent me 
 the miniature [i.e. of Keats], beautifully set, for which I return you many 
 thanks. I received your letter on February 1st, and the next morning sent 
 your message to Mr. Taylor. Whenever you are allowed to mention Hamp- 
 stead, tell him we all desire to be kindly remembered to him, and shall feel 
 happy to pay his s ; ster every attention. Fanny and she have constantly 
 corresponded since he left England. Should there be anything I could 
 do or send for you, pray write, as I shall take a pleasure in doing it. Mr. 
 Brown desires to be remembered to Mr. Keats and yourself; he wrote 
 to you the 30th of last month. For the future, any letter with the 
 initials ' F. B.' at the corner, we will leave to your discretion to give 
 to Mr. Keats, but we entrust them to your care. Your account of Italy 
 would not induce me to visit it, if I may judge by the feeling of those you 
 have had to^ deal with ; their want of it annoys me beyond description. 
 Fanny desires to be particularly remembered to you. With love to Mr. 
 Keats, 
 
 " I remain, my dear Mr. Severn, 
 
 " Your sincere and obliged friend, 
 
 " Frances Brawne." 
 
 In his December attack Keats seems to have reached the 
 crisis the day after Christmas, when, though still in des- 
 perate straits, he visibly began to mend. I have before 
 me an unfinished letter by Severn, probably intended for 
 Mr. Taylor. It is dated the 24th of December, and is as 
 follows : — 
 
 " Some, 
 "December 24th, 1820. 
 "My beak Sir, 
 
 "Keats has changed somewhat for the worse — at least his mind 
 has much, very much — and this leaves his state much the same and quite 
 as hopeless. Yet the blood has ceased to come ; his digestion is better, 
 and but for a cough he must be improving, that is, as respects his body. 
 But the fatal prospect of consumption hangs before his mind's eye, and 
 
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A BEIEF BALLY. 81 
 
 turns everything to despair and wretchedness. He will not hear a word 
 about living — nay, I seem to lose his confidence by trying to give him 
 this hope [for his knowledge of internal anatomy enables him to judge of 
 every change accurately, and adds largely to his torture].* He will not 
 think his future prospects favourable. He says the continued stretch of 
 his imagination has already killed him. He will not hear of his good 
 friends in England, except for what they have done — and this is another 
 load ; but of their high hopes of him, his certain success, his experience, 
 he will not hear a word. Then the want of some kind hope to feed his 
 voracious imagination " 
 
 In this brief unfinished letter alone there is revealed to 
 the close student of Keats's life and character the true secret 
 of the misery of the last year of his life. " The continued 
 stretch of his imagination has already killed him " — " the 
 want of some kind hope to feed his voracious imagination." 
 These two phrases bear out Keats's own poignant remarks 
 about himself. With a constitution undermined by organic 
 weakness, partly inherited and partly induced, and with an 
 intellect so ardent, so fiercely alive, that it never rested, 
 consuming itself if defrauded of the objects of its eager 
 pursuit, he was unable to withstand, in the last straits 
 of prostration, the devouring flame of an incontrollable 
 imagination ; and above all he was tortured by the image 
 of the woman he loved, whose features, voice, and bodily 
 presence were conjured up by his mind by night and by 
 day, the woman whom he would fain forget for a little while, 
 since she could never be his, and was already irrevocably 
 removed from him, surrounded, to his imagination, by all 
 the vanished hopes, dead ambitions, and impossible ideals 
 he had erewhile cherished. 
 
 Before New Year's Day the fever had abated, and each 
 succeeding day Keats, to the astonishment of those about 
 him, rallied more and more, till, as we have seen, Severn 
 was able to send encouraging news to expectant friends in 
 England. 
 
 " By the beginning of the month he had rallied wonderfully. He was 
 able not only to get up, but to go out and enjoy the warmth in the 
 sunlight, although not for a moment was he to be once more deluded by 
 
 * The words within brackets are scored through in the original. 
 
 G 
 
82 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 even the meagre hope of any other cessation to his pains than that of 
 death. We went out in a quiet way, not to see sights, but just for him to 
 breathe the sunny air, which invariably made him pleasant and witty. 
 The fine public walk on the Pincio was our principal place of resort, 
 particularly as it was sheltered from the north wind, and was warm like 
 summer, with a balmy air. By this time we had made the acquaintance 
 of a Lieutenant Elton, a gentlemanly young officer, tall and handsome, 
 though consumptive, yet, despite his complaint, always an excellent 
 companion for Keats. He regularly joined us for our stroll on the Pincio, 
 and at first we were invariably a trio, for, until Keats seemed to be 
 really gaining in resistive power, I could not bring myself to leave him 
 even for my art. On the fashionable promenade we frequently met the 
 celebrated beauty and grande dame, the Princess Buonaparte, sister of 
 Napoleon, who was the wife of the great Boman seignior, Prince Borghese. 
 She was still very handsome, both in countenance and person, and had 
 a very haughty air, save that it was at times unbent by such coquettish 
 glances that we all agreed the sight was uncommon, and that it quite 
 realised the Armida fame of the lady. There was a degree of likeness 
 to her brother Napoleon. This gay lady lived at the Villa Paulina in 
 great splendour, of course quite separated from her husband, the Prince 
 Borghese, and made herself notorious in many ways peculiar to herself. 
 Oanova had just done a nude statue from her, which we went to see, and 
 thought it ' beautiful bad taste.' It was Keats gave this statue its lasting 
 name, ' The iEolian Harp.' But among other virtues which distinguished 
 this eminent lady was a quick eye for a handsome figure and fine features, 
 and hence it came about that she cast languishing glances upon Lieu- 
 tenant Elton each time we encountered her. At last this so jarred upon 
 Keats's nerves, though he thankfully acknowledged that he was not the 
 attraction, that we were obliged to go and take our walk in another place. 
 Elton gladly enough acquiesced, for, as I have said, he too was con- 
 sumptive, and shunned all excitements ; and to be with us was a pleasure, 
 for he was quite alone in Borne. He more than once assured me that his 
 first symptoms of decline were caused by his bolting his food at his meals. 
 I may add that he survived Keats nearly a year. 
 
 " 'Twas a joy to me to see the latter improve from day to day. The 
 winter being very fine he was able to walk out every day, and at times 
 was even like his own self. Erelong I proposed that my two friends, 
 who always went at a snail's pace, should try the effect of riding together. 
 Both found that they were quite able to go on horseback, though their 
 rides were never anything else than slow walks. In this way I was 
 able to get some glorious strolls at my own pace, and indulge in uninter- 
 rupted speculations, and these remain in my mind amid the most agree- 
 able and fascinating reminiscences of dear Borne. The season was more 
 like the lovely Italian spring than winter, and as I had had few oppor- 
 tunities in my continued London life of seeing nature in her beauty, or 
 even in her vigour, it was with no small delight that then and later I saw 
 this burst of vegetation, this early festival of Flora. How well I remember 
 
SEVERN'S DEATH- BED PORTRAIT OF KEATS. 83 
 
 risking my life in getting a wallflower on a ledge of the Colosseum, far 
 Keats to feel how all the air could be scented by its keen perfume ! The 
 eye was doubly charmed with the grandeur of antiquity in its noblest 
 lorms, and with the sweet freshness of nature exulting over all its lofty 
 walls and precipitous ledges. The huge ruins, consisting of massive 
 boulders, amazed me, for I wondered how the latter were ever lifted and 
 joined. ... In this way I saw many of the finest ruins at the most 
 favourable moment, and was able to entertain Keats with my descriptions. 
 His rides did not extend far, and of course he could walk but the shortest 
 distance ; besides, Dr. Clark was afraid of the excitement which might be 
 caused by his beholding stupendous and world-famous sights. But he 
 was able not only to ride at a slow walk about the Pincio, but also 
 along the banks of the Tiber, beyond the Porta del Popolo ; and such was 
 the good effect on his mind, as well as his body, that he seemed to be 
 recovering, and I was even rash enough to again cherish a faint hope. 
 These bright moments were sadly counterbalanced by the sad and pathetic 
 poignancy of his mental sufferings and forlorn hopes. It was a hard task 
 to keep him even outwardly soothed, and still harder to hazard any 
 encouragement. What made it still more severe was the fact of his 
 surgical education having prepared him to judge correctly of his own case, 
 so that, whatever sympathy I might evince, I was not allowed to entertain 
 in his hearing a hope of his living. He always explained his own case so 
 clearly and convincingly, and so calmly described just how he would die 
 and when, that I had no answer but silence, and he knew it. Often, even 
 in those latter days, he showed his charming wit and humour, which a 
 stranger might easily have mistaken for gay spirits and natural fun. He 
 wrote nothing, but we talked on many themes, and even on poetry. Once, 
 when I was talking of Tasso, my great favourite, he said that he anti- 
 cipated 'he should become a greater poet if he were allowed to live ; ' but 
 immediately he shook his head, and bewailed his cruel fate that he was 
 about to be cut off before he had completed anything great."* 
 
 But this calm was not to last. At the end of January a 
 new disaster befel him, for he had another most alarming 
 attack — a spitting of blood in such quantity that he declared 
 it to be the forerunner of his death. 
 
 On the night of Keats's fatal relapse Severn, though worn 
 with fatigue and anxiety, perplexed himself with Tagrant 
 thoughts as to how best to occupy himself, for he could not 
 venture to fall asleep lest the swoon-sunken invalid should 
 awake and need immediate attention, or perhaps die 
 
 * It is not quite clear whether Severn means that Keats compared 
 himself with Tasso, or merely meant that if his life were prolonged he 
 should do something excelling anything he had hitherto accomplished. 
 
 G 2 
 
84 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 unobserved. Sometimes he had passed his lonely vigils in 
 writing to friends in England, as when in the early morning 
 of January the 11th he wrote to Mrs. Brawne between one 
 and three o'clock. But on this anxious night he could not 
 put pen to paper. Suddenly, touched to tears by the wan 
 face of Keats upon the pillow, with deathly dews upon the 
 forehead, the idea occurred to him to make a drawing of his 
 friend while life yet remained. To this happy inspiration 
 we are indebted for the well-known and lovely drawing 
 reproduced on the opposite page, though this "facsimile" 
 necessarily loses much in delicacy of tone. 
 
 " Dr. Clark was taken by surprise at the suddenness of the collapse, as 
 he had a favourable opinion of his patient, and had encouraged me in 
 thinking that Keats would recover. But now I saw that the doctor no 
 longer had any hope, for he ordered the scanty food of a single anchovy a 
 day, with a morsel of bread. Although he was thus kept down in a 
 starving stal;e, ye't thWe was always the fear of his ulcerated lungs resuming 
 their late dangerous condition. This shortly happened, and at once threw 
 him back to the blackest despair. He had no hope for himself save a 
 speedy death, and this now seemed denied to him, for he believed that he 
 might be doomed to linger on all through the spring. His despair was 
 more on my account, for, as he explained, his death might be a long 
 and lingering one, attended with a slow delirious death-stage. This was in 
 apprehension his greatest pain, and having been foreseen had been pre- 
 pared for. One day, tormented by the pangs of hunger, he broke down 
 suddenly and demanded that this ' foreseen resource' should be given him. 
 The demand was for the phial of laudanum I had bought at his 
 request at Gravesend. When I demurred, he said to me that he claimed it 
 as his own and his right, for, he added with great emotion, 'As my 
 death is certain, I only wish to save you from the long miseries of attending 
 and beholding it. It may yet be deferred, and I can see that you will 
 thereby be stranded through your lack of resources, and that you will ruin 
 all your prospects. I am keeping you from your painting, and as I am 
 sure to die, why not let me die now ? I have now determined to take 
 this laudanum, and anticipate a lingering death, while emancipating you.' 
 Of course I was horrified, and tried in every way to explain the madness 
 of the act, and to urge the cruelty it would evince to all his friends, 
 and indifference to their efforts for him. Again and again I urged this, 
 affirming my right as the principal of these friends, and assuring him that 
 I should never be tired of him or of my ministrations, and that even on 
 the score of my immediate prospects I was in no fear of perdition, for 
 I expected the student's pension from the Royal Academy. This some- 
 what calmed him, but as I still refused to let him have the laudanum 
 he became furious. He even supplicated me with touching pathos, and 
 

 To fact page 84. 
 
"HE FOR HIS DEATH: AND I FOR HIS LIFE." 85 
 
 with equally touching eloquence described the rcnnuor of his death by 
 continued diarrhoea ; but on my persistent refusal he grew move and more 
 violent against me, and I was afraid he might die in the midst of his 
 despairing rage. And yet in all this thore was no fear of death, no want 
 of fortitudo or manliness, but only the strong feeling on my accouut to 
 which he regarded himself and his dying as secondary. So for long we 
 contended — he for his death, and I for his life. I told Dr. Clark about 
 the bottle of laudanum, and he took it away with him. This was on 
 the second day of our sore contention, and when he learned what I had 
 done Keats became silent and resigned, and sank into a solemn seriousness. 
 'Twas evident the physiciau was powerless to mislead the great intel- 
 ligence the invalid had of his own case. Dr. Clark came to see him many 
 times a day, and it was an awful sound and sight to see Keats look 
 round upon the doctor when he entered, with his large increasing hazel eyes 
 (for as his face decreased his eyes seemed to enlarge and shine with 
 unearthly brightness), and ask in a deep pathetic tone, ' How long is this 
 posthtimous life of mine to last?' Ever after the loss of the laudanum he 
 talked of his life as posthumous. When, on the day following my sur- 
 render of the bottle to the doctor's care, our kind friend called, and was 
 abruptly and sternly asked, ' How long is this posthumous life of mine to 
 last? ' he was unable to answer, and afterwards assured me that he could 
 not withstand the intense expression of Keats's eyes. Kow that his face 
 was so sunk and pale, those hazel eyes became more prominent and less 
 human ; indeed at times, owing to the intelligence of Keats when he was 
 questioning Dr. Clark, his eyes had the abstract expression of a super- 
 natural being, and he evidently knew well all that was passing in tho 
 doctor's mind, although the latter was unable to venture a word. After a 
 week of those tragic scenes (and daily Keats asked Dr. Clark the same 
 question as to how long his posthumous life was to last) he became some- 
 what more calm, and harrowed me by recounting the minutest details of 
 his approaching death. As I was so fortunate as never to lose my patience 
 or my temper on the most trying topics — and in his sore weakness he 
 was often regardless of my feelings — he at last became sensible of his own 
 want of dignity, such as he said ' every man should have in his dying 
 moments.' I had made him some coffee, and he threw it away. I then 
 made some more, and he threw that away also. But when I cheerfully 
 made it a third time, he was deeply affected, and confessed ' that he had 
 no agony but what he felt for me,' and that he was sure my endurance 
 of his * savageness ' arose from my long prayers on his behalf and from my 
 patient devotion to him. ' Severn,' he said to me one day, ' I now under- 
 stand how you can bear all this — 'tis your Christian faith ; and here am I, 
 with desperation in death that would disgrace the commonest fellow ! 
 How I should like it if it were possible to get some of Jeremy Taylor's 
 works for you to read to me, and I should gain consolation, for I have 
 always been a great admirer of this devout author.' " 
 
 * Although only the first of the following letters reached 
 
86 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Severn before Keats's death, it seems opportune to include 
 them here. One from the poet's publisher, Mr. Taylor, did 
 arrive before that event, and was welcome on account of 
 what it said concerning certain financial matters. Mr. Tay- 
 lor's letter was, indeed, a great relief to Severn, who had 
 been in profound anxiety on Keats's account. 
 
 About a week later, Mr. Hessey also wrote to Severn. It 
 is a long letter, the kind of epistle one would expect from a 
 clergyman of the most pronounced evangelicalism. It is 
 unnecessary to print Mr. Hessey's well-meant sermon, or 
 even the equally earnest though more interesting epistle 
 despatched a fortnight later, wherein there is " a regretful 
 remembrance of having heard poor Keats utter the most 
 extraordinary and revolting opinions." 
 
 Though this letter was written four days after Keats's 
 death, the news of that event did not reach the friends in 
 London till the 17th or 18th of March. So when Leigh 
 Hunt wrote the following letter to Severn he had no idea 
 that "the great poet and noble-hearted man," as with 
 characteristic generosity and enthusiasm he calls Keats, 
 had been dead for more than three weeks. 
 
 " Vale of Health, Hampstead, 
 
 " March 8th, 1821. 
 " Dear Severn,— 
 
 "You have concluded, of course, that I have sent no letters to 
 Borne, because I was aware of the effect they would have on Keats's mind ; 
 and this is the principal cause ; for besides what I have been told of his 
 emotion about letters in Italy, I remember his telling me on one occasion 
 that, in his sick moments, he never wished to receive another letter or 
 even to see another face however friendly. But still I should have 
 written to you, had I not been almost at death's door myself. Tou will 
 imagine how ill I have been, when you hear that I have but just begun 
 writing again for the ' Examiner ' and ' Indicator ' after an interval of several 
 months, during which my flesh wasted from me with sickness and 
 melancholy. Judge how often I thought of Keats, and with what feelings. 
 Mr. Brown tells me he is comparatively calm now. If he can bear to 
 hear of us, pray tell him ; but he knows it all already, and can put it in 
 better language than any man. I hear he does not like to be told that he 
 may get better, nor is it to be wondered at, considering his firm persuasion 
 that he shall not thrive. But if this persuasion should happen no longer 
 to be so strong upon him, or if he can now put up with such attempts to 
 
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LE1GE HUNTS LETTER ABOUT KEATS. 87 
 
 console him, remind him of what I have said a thousand times, and what 
 I still (upon my honour, I swear) think always, that I have seen too 
 many cases of recovery from apparently desperate cases of consumption, 
 not to indulge in hope to the very last. If he still cannot bear this, tell 
 him — tell that great poet and noble-hearted man that we shall all bear 
 his memory in the most precious part of our hearts, and that the world 
 shall bow their heads to it as our loves do. Or if this [ ] will trouble 
 his spirit, tell him that we shall never cease to remember and love him, 
 and that, Christian or Infidel, the most sceptical of us has faith enough in 
 the high things that nature puts into our heads, to think that all who 
 are of one accord in mind or heart are journeying to one and the same 
 place, and shall meet somehow or other again, face to face, mutually 
 conscious, mutually delighted. Tell him he is only before us on the 
 road, as he was in everything else ; or whether you tell him the latter 
 or no, tell him the former, and add, that we shall never forget that he 
 was so, and that we are coming after him. The tears are again in my 
 eyes, and I must not afford to shed them. The next letter I write shall 
 be more to yourself, and a little more refreshing to your spirits, which we 
 are sure must have been pretty taxed. But whether our friend dies or 
 not, it will not be among the least lofty of your recollections, by-and-by, 
 that you helped to smooth the sick bed of so fine a being. God bless you, 
 dear gevern. 
 
 " Your sincere friend, 
 
 " Leigh Hunt." 
 
 This is in every way a memorable letter, and readers 
 will be glad of the accompanying facsimile. It occupies 
 a single page of a quarto sheet. The two inside pages 
 are filled up with a letter from Charles Brown, to whom 
 Leigh Hunt took his letter to be supplemented by that 
 common friend if he had anything he wished to say. 
 The third page is much torn at the width-margin, and so 
 certain words can only be guessed at. The lection is given 
 
 as it stands : — 
 
 " Wentworth Place, 
 
 " 9th March, 1821. 
 " My dear Severn, — 
 
 " Upon the whole your letter ending 14th and 15th Feb. gave com- 
 fortable news. Keats, though without hope of recovery, was calm ; and your 
 health was reinstated. Ever since I first read your account of his dread- 
 ful relapse, I have never been able to hope. It was then his death took 
 place in my mind — and inwardly I mourned for him as lost. That he 
 should have so long lingered, and in pain of body, a^d in irritation of 
 mind, was a new distress. The hearing of his sufferings was worse than 
 of his hopeless state. I have sat and eagerly wished and prayed to learn 
 he was no more. Yet I was full of fears as I read over your letter, that 
 
88 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 my wishes had become realized. Let me have a look of his hair — should 
 it end as my despair tells me it will. Taylor and Haslam have had your 
 letter. I expect it back again to-morrow, when. Mr. and Mrs. Richards 
 will be here. You refer to Keats's enemies, cursing them as his friend, — 
 I suppose you mean the villains of the 'Quarterly' and 'Blackwood.' I 
 understand (as indeed Keats told me) how he intended to treat Lock- 
 hart. Now Lockhart was violently attacked in the ' London ' by John 
 Scott for his atrocious libels on Keats and others. Lockhart challenged 
 Scott, but was (it seems to me) afraid to fight. From this affair arose a 
 quarrel between Scott and one Christie, Lockhart's second. They fought 
 near Chalk Farm, and Scott is killed. Keats never liked Scott, but in 
 such a cause, how hard that he should die. I tell you this, as it is in a 
 degree part of Keats's history, and possibly you have not heard it. They 
 are in good health next door. Mrs. Brawne saw your letter, but her 
 daughter did not, from whom the worst is kept back, in (to my mind) 
 a very ill-judged way. Meanwhile she fears perhaps worse than is 
 supposed. I observe her gaiety is become boisterous, — fitt 
 one start rather than laugh ; and, at 
 seems sinking under apprehension, 
 getting better, — he has been extremely 
 asked to fill a page, and you will be 
 I heard of your friend Holmes two days 
 about to meet him (hearing he was walking 
 Hunt on the heath), to ask what he had to 
 to you, and how your family are ; but I 
 missed him. I have just been next 
 
 Mrs. Brawne sends her remembrance to you — Miss Brawne said not a 
 word, and looked so incapable of speaking, that I regretted having 
 mentioned my writing to you before her. I have so many dull thoughts 
 coming across me at every line, that I confess it is an irksome task to 
 write [even] to Severn. Yet had I anything more to say, I would not 
 spare myself for your sake; for, my dear Severn, I feel towards you as a 
 brother for your kindness to our brother Keats. 
 
 " Yours most sincerely, 
 
 " Chas. Bkown. 
 
 " P.S. — Dilke is at my elbow, and desires to be remembered to you." 
 
 " Mrs. Brawne saw your letter, but her daughter did not, 
 from whom the worst is kept back," &c. This may refer to 
 a letter which Severn wrote to Brown by the English Mail 
 leaving Borne on the 15th (the contents of which would be 
 similar to those in the letter next printed here), or, more 
 probably, to the letter to Mrs. Brawne herself, directed (as 
 Severn was once requested to do) to her to Brown's care — a 
 precaution taken on Miss Brawne's behalf. 
 
LONG LETTER TO MRS. BRAWNE. 89 
 
 " Rome, 
 "12th February, 1821. 
 ■" My dear Mrs. Brawne, — 
 
 " I have just received your letter of the 15th — the contrast of your 
 
 ■quiet friendly Hampstead with this lonely place and our poor suffering 
 
 Keats brings the tears into my eyes. I wish many, many times that he 
 
 had never left you. His recovery must have been impossible whilst he 
 
 was in England, and his excessive grief since has made it more so. In 
 
 your care he seems to me like an infant in its mother's arms— you 
 
 would have smoothed down his pain by varieties, his death might have 
 
 been eased by the sight of his many friends. But here, with one solitary 
 
 friend, in a place else savage for an invalid he has had one more pang 
 
 added to his many, for I have had the hardest task in keeping from him 
 
 my painful situation. I have kept him alive by these means week after 
 
 week. He had refused all food, but I tried him every way — I left him no 
 
 •excuse. Many times I have prepared his meals six times over, and kept 
 
 from him the trouble I had in doing it. I have not been able to leave 
 
 him, that is, I have not dared to do it, but when he slept. Had he come 
 
 here alone he would have plunged into the grave in secret — we should 
 
 never have known one syllable about him. This reflection alone repays 
 
 me for all I have done. It is impossible to conceive what the sufferings 
 
 of this poor fellow have been. Now he is still alive and calm. If I say 
 
 more I shall say too much. Yet at times I have hoped he would recover, 
 
 but the Doctor shook his head, and Keats would not hear that he was 
 
 better — the thought of recovery is beyond everything dreadful to him. 
 
 We now dare not perceive any improvement, for the hope of death seems 
 
 his only comfort. He talks of the quiet grave as the first rest he can 
 
 ever have. I can believe and feel this most truly. In the last week a 
 
 great desire for books came across his mind. I got him all the books at 
 
 hand and for three days this charm lasted on him, but now it is gone. Yet 
 
 he is very calm — he is more and more reconciled to his fortunes. 
 
 " Feb. 14th. — Little or no change has taken place in Keats since the 
 commencement of this, except this beautiful one that his mind is growing 
 to great quietness and peace — I find this change has its rise from the 
 increasing weakness of his body, but it seems like a delightful sleep to 
 me. I have been beating about in the tempest of his mind so long. 
 To-night he has talked very much to me, but so easily that he at last 
 fell into a pleasant sleep — he seems to have comfortable dreams without 
 nightmare. This will bring on some change — it oannot be worse, it may 
 be better. Among the many things he has requested of me to-night, 
 this is the principal, that on his grave shall be this— i- 
 
 ' Here lies one whose name was writ in water.' 
 
 " You will understand this so well that I will not say a word about it, 
 but is it not dreadful that he should with all his misfortunes on his mind 
 and perhaps wrought up to their abisme, end his life without one jot of 
 human happiness? When he first came here he purchased a copy of 
 
90 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Alfieri, but put it down at the second page — ' Misera me ! ' He was much 
 affected at this passage. 
 
 'Misera me! Sollievo a me non resta 
 Altro che '1 pianto, ed il pianto e delitto.' 
 * * * * * 
 
 " Since, a letter has come. I gave it to Keats, supposing it to be one 
 of yours, but it proved sadly otherwise. The glance of that letter tore 
 him to pieces. The effects were on him for many days — he did not read 
 it — he could not, but requested me to place it in his coffin together with 
 a purse and letter (unopened) of his sister's, since which time he has 
 requested me not to place that letter in his coffin, but only his sister's 
 purse and letter with some hair. Then (?) he found many causes of his 
 illness in the exciting and thwarting of his passions, but I persuaded him 
 to feel otherwise on this delicate point. In his most irritable state he 
 sees a friendless world with everything that his life presents, particularly 
 the kindness of his friends tending to his untimely death. I have got an 
 English nurse to come two hours every other day ; so that I have quite 
 recovered my health, but my nurse after coming three times has been 
 taken ill to-day — this is a little unfortunate as Keats seems to like her. 
 You see I cannot do anything until poor Keats is asleep : this morning 
 he has waked very calm — I think he seems somewhat better. He has 
 taken half a pint of fresh milk ; the milk here is beautiful to all the senses 
 — it is delicious — for three weeks he has lived on it, sometimes taking a 
 pint and a half in a day. 
 
 " You astonish me about . . . poor Keats is a martyr to the tricks of 
 these infernal scoundrels, others Resides Gr. . . his is rather the fault of 
 his ( ) than his heart. I can understand him — but the others — ten 
 
 thousand curses light upon them. Not only our friend's life, but his 
 very nature has been torn to pieces by them — that he is here a thousand 
 miles from his dear home, dying without one comfort but me when — 
 I cannot bear to think of it. The Doctor has been — he thinks Keats 
 worse. He says the expectoration is the most dreadful he ever saw- 
 never met an instance where a patient was so quickly pulled down. 
 Keats's inward grief must have been beyond any limit — -his lungs are in 
 a dreadful state. His stomach has lost all its power — Keats says he has 
 fretted to death — from the first drops of blood he knew he must die. He 
 says no common chance of liviDg was for him." 
 
 If Keats, to the regret of Messrs. Taylor and Hessey, died 
 without the benefit of those gentlemen's spiritual exhorta- 
 tions, he at least had the pleasure of gratification in his 
 wish as to temporary possession of one of Jeremy Taylor's 
 works. 
 
 The first allusion to this in point of date is in one of 
 Severn's February letters to Brown : — 
 
KEATS' S LAST DAYS. 91 
 
 " 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 aie 
 reading. You are enduring forme more than I would have you. 0! 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. Torlonia, the banker, has 
 refused us any more money; the bill is returned unaccepted, and to- 
 morrow I must pay my last crown/or this cursed lodging-place : and, what 
 is more, if he dies all the beds and furniture will be burnt and the walls 
 scraped, and they will come on me for a hundred pounds or more. But, 
 above all, this noble fellow lying on the bed and without the common 
 spiritual comforts that many a rogue and fool has in his last moments : 
 if I do break down it will be under this; but I pray that some angel of 
 goodness may yet lead him through this dark wilderness. If I could leave 
 Keats every day for a time I could soon raise money by my painting, but 
 he will not let me out of his sight, ho will not bear the face of a stranger. 
 I would rather cut my tongue out than tell him I must get the money — 
 that would kill him at a word. You see my hopes of being kept by the 
 Eoyal Academy will be cut off unless I send a picture by the spring. I 
 have written to Sir T. Lawrence. I have got a volume of Jeremy Taylor's 
 ■works, which Keats has heard me read to-night. This is a treasure indeed, 
 and came when I should have thought it hopeless. Why may not other 
 good things come ? I will keep myself up with such hopes. Dr. Clark is 
 still the same, though he knows about the bill; he is afraid the next 
 change will be to diarrhoea. Keats sees all this — his knowledge of anatomy 
 makes every change tenfold worse; every way he is unfortunate, yet every 
 one offers me assistance on his account. He cannot read any letters, he 
 has made me put them by him unopened. They tear him to pieces — he 
 dare not look on the outside of any more ; make this known." 
 
 In the ' Recollections,' the incident is thus intro- 
 duced : — 
 
 "Dr. Clark succeeded in obtaining a copy of Jeremy Taylor's 'Holy 
 Living and Dying,' and thereafter I read daily to poor Keats, both morning 
 and evening, from this pious work, and he received great comfort. When he 
 became restless, and when he was willing, I prayed by him, and so a -great 
 change and calmness grew upon him, and my task was much lightened. 
 If I had no longer any hope in the prolongation of his life, yet the gentle 
 Christian spirit beginning to soften the rigour of his dying, relieved me 
 more than I can well account for. 
 
 " He kept continually in his hand a polished, oval, white cornelian, the 
 gift of his widowing love, and at times it seemed his only consolation, the 
 only thing left him in this world clearly tangible. Many letters which he 
 was unable to read came for him. Some he allowed nte to read to him ; 
 others were too worldly — for, as he said, he had ' already journeyed far 
 
92 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 beyond them.' There were two letters, I remember, for which he had no 
 words, but he made me understand that I was to place them on his heart 
 within his winding-sheet. 
 
 " Those bright falcon eyes, which I had known only in joyous inter- 
 course, while revelling in books and nature, or while he was reciting his 
 •own poetry, now beamed with an unearthly brightness and a penetrating 
 steadfastness that could not be looked at " 
 
 Throughout the long and trying period of Severn's 
 unflagging ministry to his dying friend he had been fertile 
 in expedients, in trivial matters as well as in pecuniary 
 troubles. He has himself told us how, overcome with 
 fatigue, he would sometimes fall asleep in the night-watches, 
 and, awaking, find himself enveloped in total darkness. 
 
 " To remedy this, one night I tried the experiment of fixing a thread 
 from the bottom of a lighted candle to the wick of an unlighted one, that 
 the flame might be conducted, all which I did without telling Keats. 
 When he awoke and found the first candle nearly out, he was reluctant to 
 wake me, and while doubting, suddenly cried out, ' Severn, Severn ! here's 
 & little fairy lamplighter actually lit up the other candle.' " 
 
 Certainly no one had a more loyal friend and tender 
 nurse than Keats had in Severn. There is a touch of deep 
 pathos in the latter's simple yet eloquent words : — 
 
 " Poor Keats has me ever by him, and shadows out the form of one 
 solitary friend ; he opens his eyes in great doubt and horror, but when 
 they fall on me they close gently, open quietly and close again, till he 
 sinks to sleep." 
 
 This passage occurs in one of the most pathetic of all 
 Severn's letters to his friends. It was addressed to Haslam, 
 and was written the day before Keats's death. 
 
 " Feb. 22nd. 
 " My Dbab Haslam, — 
 
 " 0, how anxious I am to hear from you ! I have nothing to break 
 this dreadful solitude but letters. Day after day, night after night, here I 
 am by our poor dying friend. My spirits, my intellect, and my health 
 are breaking down. I can get no one to change with me — no one to 
 relieve me. All run away, and even if they, did not, Keats would not do 
 without me. Last night I thought he was going, I could hear the phlegm 
 in his throat ; he bade me lift him up on the bed or he would die with pain. 
 I watched him all night, expecting him to be suffocated at every cough. 
 This morning, by the pale daylight, the change in him frightened me ; he 
 has sunk in the last three days to a most ghastly look. Though Dr. Clark 
 
DEATH OF KEATS. 93- 
 
 has prepared me for the worst, I shall be ill able to bear to be set free even 
 from this, my horrible situation, by the loss of him. I am still quite 
 precluded from painting, which may be of consequence to me. Poor Keats 
 has me ever by him, and shadows out the form of one solitary friend ; he 
 opens his eyes in great doubt and horror, but when they fall upon me they 
 close gently, open quietly and close again, till he sinks to sleep. This 
 thought alone would keep mo by him till he dies ; and why did I say I was 
 losing my time ? The advantages I have gained by knowing John Keats 
 are double and treble any I could have won by any other occupation. 
 Farewell." 
 
 "At times during his last' days," says Severn in a memorable passage,* 
 " he made me go to see the place where he was to be buried, and he 
 expressed pleasure at my description of the locality of the Pyramid of 
 Caius Cestius, about the grass and the many flowers, particularly the 
 innumerable violets, also about a flock of goats and sheep and a young 
 shepherd — all these intensely interested him. Violets were his favourite- 
 flowers, and he joyed to hear how they overspread the graves. He assured 
 me ' that he already seemed to feel the flowers growing over him.' 
 
 " During the last few days of his life he became very calm and resigned. 
 Again and again, while warning me that his death was fast approaching,, 
 he besought me to take all care of myself, telling me that ' I must not 
 look at him in his dying gasp nor breathe his passing breath, not even, 
 breathe upon him.' From time to time he gave me all his directions 
 as to what he wanted done after his death. It was in the same sad 
 hour when he told me with greater agitation than he had shown on 
 any other subject, to put the letter which had just come from Miss 
 Brawne (which he was unable to bring himself to read, or even to 
 open), with any other that should arrive too late to reach him in life, 
 inside his winding-sheet on his heart — it was then, also, that he asked 
 that I should see cut upon his gravestone as sole inscription, not Ms- 
 name, but simply ' Here lies one whose name was writ in water.' " 
 
 Throughout Keats's latter days Severn was much cheered 
 by the sympathy and constant attention of Dr. and Mrs- 
 Clark, and of Mr. William Ewing, an English sculptor, who 
 had a profound interest in the dying poet, and was eager to 
 be of any service to him or his devoted friend. But at last 
 the inevitable moment came. 
 
 " He remained quiet to the end, which made the death-summons- 
 more terrible. It happened about half-past four on the afternoon of 
 Friday, the 23rd. He held my hand to the last, and he looked up at me 
 until his eyes lost their speculation and dimmed in death. I could hear 
 
 \ 
 * Already familiar in various wordings. Here I follow the text of his 
 MS. ' Eecollections.' \ 
 
'94 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 the phlegm boiling and tearing his chest. He gasped to me to lift him 
 up, and in a short time died in my arms without effort, and even with 
 deadly rejoicing that it had come at last, that for which he had so 
 ardently longed for months. And I confess that his pallid dead face 
 was for awhile to me a consolation, for I had seen it express such 
 suffering. I had seen it waste away in that suffering, and I had seen 
 that suffering long and in loneliness, and it was a happiness to think that 
 the poor fellow's misery was over." 
 
 And so the long tragic episode came to a close, and with 
 -the relaxation of the severe strain Severn gave way com- 
 pletely. Even four or five days later, he could not at 
 first sufficiently control his grief to finish a letter he 
 began, intended for Brown. The*fragment remains among 
 his papers. 
 
 " My dear Brown," it begins, and then goes on without further preamble, 
 " He is gone. He died with the most perfect ease. He seemed to go to 
 sleep. On the 23rd, Friday, at half-past four, the approach of death 
 oame on. ' Severn — I — lift me up, for I am dying. I shall die easy. 
 Don't be frightened ! Thank God it has come.' I lifted him up in my 
 arms, and the phlegm seemed boiling in his throat. This increased until 
 eleven at night, when he gradually sank into death, so quiet, that I still 
 thought he slept — but I cannot say more now. I am broken down 
 beyond my strength. I cannot be left alone. I have not slept for nine 
 
 days, I will say the days since On Saturday a gentleman came to 
 
 «ast the face, hand, and foot. On Sunday his body was opened ; the 
 lungs were completely gone, the doctors could not conceive how he 
 had lived in the last two months. Dr. Clark will write you on this 
 head. ...."; 
 
 The letter is scrawled, and as though written by a 
 tremulous hand. It breaks off just over the second page, 
 and on the third is a roughly drawn but suggestive figure 
 of one mourning — reproduced on the opposite page. 
 
 It is not surprising that, with all his fortitude and philo- 
 sophical way of looking always at the best side of things, 
 Severn was utterly prostrated. He was, truly enough, glad 
 to see the calm of death upon the features he had so often 
 beheld distraught by bodily and mental agony: and yet 
 the final loss of so dear a friend was a bitter grief : " one 
 so dear that up to his death I knew not how to trace its 
 value, one so fascinating, not only in the power of his 
 genius, but also in the charm of his manners, and one I had 
 
MOURNING FIGURE, FEOM THE THIRD PAGE OF UNFINISHED LETTER 
 ANNOUNCING THE DEATH OF KEATS. 
 
 To face jiage 94. 
 
SEVEB2PS MANY TROUBLES. 95 
 
 known so long in the constant and sincere communion of 
 our two arts of Poetry and Painting — this great loss, the 
 loss of all these, came upon me, and I sank under the 
 blow most painfully ; with difficulty, and only, indeed, by a 
 great effort, recovering sufficiently to be present at the 
 funeral." 
 
 " The first thing Dr. Clark did when he arrived too late to see Keats 
 again in life was to feel my pulse, to command me to keep perfectly quiet, 
 and to order an English nurse to take charge of the sick-room. Mr. 
 Ewing also kindly came to aid me in my new harassing trouble, for, on 
 the head of my partial collapse, came an unlooked-for sore annoyance. 
 The vile indiscriminating Koman law required that all the furniture 
 should be burned.and the rooms refurnished and everyway restored. In 
 this new disaster Dr. Clark was a true friend in need, and managed to 
 reduce the heavy charges down to one-half the amount demanded from me. 
 Ultimately, too, the sitting-room was left untouched, mainly on account 
 of the hired pianoforte, which I refused to be allowed to be touched ; and 
 as in connection with my protesting guardianship of it I was able to 
 prove that I had never carried my dying friend into the room, it followed 
 that nothing else therein could be touched. But the expenses were 
 heavy enough otherwise, and the whole affair most distressing and 
 shameful." 
 
 In a letter written eight days later (March 3rd) Severn 
 returns to this matter, which evidently caused him profound 
 annoyance. To judge from this unsigned and unfinished 
 note, the delay on the part of the persons deputed by the 
 municipality to see to the demolition of ' infected furniture ' 
 must have been unduly prolonged. 
 
 " Those brutal Italians," says Severn, " have nearly done their monstrous 
 business. They have burned the furniture — they have done their meet- 
 ings^ — and I believe, at least hope, no more of these cursed cruelties will 
 take place. They have racked me in my most painful moments, and I 
 have suffered so much that my nerves are sadly affected. Four days 
 before poor Keats died the change was so great that I passed dark 
 moments of dread. He was aware of it himself. He made me lift him 
 up in the bed many times. The apprehension of death was strong upon 
 him, but its effect was only that of giving him comfort. He seemed only 
 affected when the morning came and still found him alive, and he grieved 
 inwardly until some further change made him hope that the night would 
 
 bring death. Each day he would look up in the doctor's face 
 
 This look was more than we could ever bear. The extreme brightness of 
 his eyes with his poor pallid face were dreadful beyond description. These 
 our last nights I watched him ; on the fifth the doctor prepared me for 
 
96 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 his death. — this day I cannot dare think on. Some future time I will 
 write of it, now I cannot but say little." 
 
 " The burning of the furniture in the death-room,'' says Severn else- 
 where, " took place in the Piazza di Spagna. Then the walls were all done 
 up afresh, and I had scarcely paid the shameful demand when the brute of 
 a landlady sent for me to pay for the crockery broken in our service, and 
 I was at once indignant and amused to find a long table covered with the 
 broken crockery of what must have been the debris of the whole parish. 
 I assumed to be in a mad rage, and with my stick I dashed and smashed 
 everything that was on the table, and singularly enough I frightened the 
 vile creature of a landlady, with the result that I never heard any more 
 about the crockery." 
 
 But before this the funeral of the poet had taken place r 
 almost unnoticed by the English visitors in Eome. Lieu- 
 tenant Elton was away, and there was no one else among 
 those who had known Keats, besides Severn, Dr. Clark, and 
 William Ewing, to follow in the meagre procession to the 
 grave. 
 
 " Keats was laid to rest under the sods of a grassy slope in the old 
 ground of Monte Testaccio, where all Protestants and others outside the 
 pale of the Roman Catholic Church were interred. He had the noble- 
 pyramid of Caius Cestius over him — in all, so beautiful a scene that it 
 formed one of the few pleasant things on which he liked to dwell during 
 his last days. It was a real consolation to him that he was to be laid in 
 so lovely a place of rest, and in the companionship of so many sons of 
 misery like himself, men of genius and enterprise who had found an early 
 grave at Rome. This was the only theme on which he tried, in the midst 
 of his anguish, to be once more the poet — since that of his 'having one 
 poor friend to close his eyes' — though on this he spoke only with his 
 
 ' 111, and almost prostrated and grief-stricken as I was, it was all I 
 could do to attend the funeral, but was aided by my friend Ewing. 
 Several English visitors who, since his death, had suddenly become 
 interested in his pathetic story (or such of it as was known), attended at 
 the final ceremony. I was deeply affected at this last closing scene r 
 particularly as I was the only personal friend present from among the 
 little band of devoted friends whom the poet had left behind in England. 
 After my recovery I visited this sacred spot continually until the advent 
 of the Italian summer." 
 
 In that beautiful graveyard, doubly sacred as enshrining 
 also the ashes of Shelley, Keats was laid among the flowers 
 he loved best, which he had "almost felt growing over 
 him " ; " and there they do grow," writes Lord Houghton, 
 
MISS BRAWNE AND KEATS" S DEATH. 97 
 
 "even all the winter long — violets and daisies mingling 
 with the fresh herbage, and, in the words of Shelley, 
 ' making one in love with death to think that one should 
 be buried in so sweet a place.' " 
 
 A few weeks after Severn, ill and lonely in his great 
 sorrow, was left to begin his career anew : the tide of welfare 
 had turned. The first welcome boon was the recovery of 
 health ; and among the earliest " luxuries " he allowed 
 himself were hours of contemplation and rest in the valley 
 of Monte Testaccio. 
 
 In the early summer, writing to Haslam, he says : " Poor 
 Keats has now his wish — his humble wish : he is at peace in 
 the quiet grave. I walked there a few days ago, and found 
 the daisies had grown all over it. It is in' one of the most 
 lovely retired spots in Rome. You cannot have such a 
 place in England. I visit it with a delicious melancholy 
 which relieves my sadness. When I recollect for how long 
 Keats had never been one day free from ferment and torture 
 of mind and body, and that now he lies at rest with the 
 flowers he so desired above him, with no sound in the air 
 but the tinkling bells of a few simple sheep and goats, I 
 feel indeed grateful that he is here, and remember how 
 earnestly I prayed that his sufferings might end, and that 
 he might be removed from a world where no one grain of 
 comfort remained for him." 
 
 At this point it is opportune to return to some of Severn's 
 correspondence belonging to the period immediately succeed- 
 ing the death of Keats. In answer to his already quoted 
 letter to Brown, announcing the end of all their hopes and 
 fears, that loyal friend' of both wrote, on March 23rd, as 
 follows : — 
 
 " From the first account you gave of Keats's relapse in December, I 
 never had a hope, as you may have perceived by the constant strain of 
 despair in my letters. At last your news, passing from bad to worse, and 
 from worse to worst (I will confess it), became too distressing to make me 
 congratulate myself he was yet alive. Had I been with him I could have 
 
98 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEEN. 
 
 borne all this with an equal mind, and, perhaps, as you did, hoped. StiH ' 
 when the blow actually came, I felt at the moment utterly unprepared for 
 it. Then she, — she was to have it told her, and the worst had been con- 
 cealed from her knowledge ever since your December letter. It is now 
 five days since she heard it. I shall not speak of the first shock, nor of 
 the following days, — it is enough she is now pretty well, — and thro'out 
 she has shown a firmness of mind which I little expected from one so 
 young, and under such a load of grief. To-morrow I shall be expecting 
 the promised letter of mournful particulars ; and, what I am now most 
 anxious about, a true account of your health. My solicitude seems trans- 
 ferred from him to you. Under Dr. Clark's friendly care everything I 
 feel confident will be done towards reinstating your strength of body as 
 soon as possible. Ah, I write this idly, — for before you read these lines 
 you will be well and cheerful, — you ought to be so. The hand of God 
 took our friend away, and to God, in all His behests, am I ever resigned. 
 I never yet lost any one by the hand of man, though that (you will say) is 
 still by the will of God, but certainly with a difference, — I mean by a> 
 violent death, and know not how I could bear the loss of any one in that 
 manner ; but here, though enemies have preyed upon him, I am quite- 
 resigned, for those very enemies knew not' what they were doing, whose 
 heart they were breaking. The highest praise that mortal can have belonged) 
 to Keats : no one ever saw him without loving him, no one could know 
 him and treat him unkindly : so convinced am I of this that I acquit his 
 brother of malevolence. There is no more news from that same brother. 
 I wrote to Haslam to call on Abbey, and if Abbey will permit it, Mrs. 
 Brawne and Mrs. Dilke will call on Miss Keats. They are in mourning next 
 door. As for myself, though such things are a mere form, I mourn for 
 him outwardly as well as inwardly ; as for a brother. My last letter was 
 dated either ten or fourteen days ago, one side had a letter from Hunt. 
 Mrs. Eichards called on your sister nine days ago, and gave the good 
 account you had then written of yourself. When I hear you are cheerily 
 again, she shall again hear of you. All our friends in common are well. 
 John Scott's death has made some noise, and seems to threaten Mrs. 
 Christie and the seconds seriously ; they certainly behaved most foolishly. 
 What is melancholy, and almost incomprehensible, is that Mrs. Scott 
 advertizes for a subscription. Hazlitt is to be chief man of the ' London 
 Magazine,' Hunt will likewise write for it; he has put a stop to his 
 ' Indicator.' I have not yet seen Haydon's ' Agony in the Garden;' it does 
 not appear to create a very great enthusiasm, some find fault with it for 
 being a little melodramatic. It is surely a great mistake to represent 
 Judas as a palpable villain in his countenance, which I understand he has 
 done in the extreme ; he ought to possess a good taking face, one whom an 
 honest man might trust. There, I have given you a page of chitchat, 
 such as it is. 
 
 " God love you, my dear fellow, and believe me ever 
 
 " Yours sincerely, 
 
 "Chaeles Brown." 
 
KEATS' S WILL. 99 
 
 This letter, one of interest and value, was not written 
 immediately on receipt of Severn's (as indicated in an early 
 passage), but about five days later and in time for the 
 Italian mail. The next letter given here, that from 
 Mr. Taylor, has also special interest, particularly for 
 students of Keats's ' Life ' in its fullest details. 
 
 "London, 
 "3rd April, 1821. 
 " My dear Sib, 
 
 " Your first interesting letter since our dear friend's death lias just 
 reached me, hut I was previously aware of the melancholy issue of this 
 deplorahle trial to which you have heen subjected, hy your short letter 
 to Brown ahout three weeks ago. To us here who had sympathised most 
 sincerely with you in all our poor friend's afflictions, it really came like 
 
 a relief at last to hear that all was over You will greatly ohlige 
 
 me hy continuing to relate as often as you can find time and inclination, 
 any particulars of our friend's life and conversation, giving me as nearly 
 as possible the identical words used hy him. I have heen requested by 
 several of our friends to write a short account of his life, and for this 
 purpose the most valuable of my materials will he those communications 
 which you are able to make me. Did you ever remember my wish to 
 have a portrait of him? I hope you have one for me. 
 
 "That which Mr. Brown has is an admirable likeness, and will do 
 better than any perhaps to engrave from, but as a picture I would rather 
 have a sketch in anything taken from the life than a copy merely. If 
 there are any papers left by our poor friend which you think will be 
 interesting, please to take care of them, as well as of his books. In a little 
 will, or memorandum of what he wished to be done after his death, which 
 he sent me in a letter previous to leaving Hampstead, and which, so far 
 at least as this one particular- goes, constitutes me a kind of executor, 
 he desired me to divide his books among his friends, and states in which 
 order his debts are to be paid if ever there should be money forthcoming 
 to discharge them. I have written to George to ask him for some of that 
 money which John lent him. In the meantime I was compelled to try 
 among a few friends here to raise money after that was gone, which we 
 proposed to advance. Five of those who had seen poor Keats sufficiently 
 to feel much interest for him have told me to apply to them for £10 each 
 whenever it is wanted, and the Earl Fitzwilliam, to whom I wrote on the 
 same subject, sent me £50. For this £100 you will please to draw if you 
 have not done it already. Should it prove enough to defray the expenses 
 of the funeral, &c, and to repay the kind Dr. Clark, I shall he very glad. 
 When I wrote to you before on this subject, I did not state how this 
 money was to be collected, for fear of poor Keats being aware of the 
 circumstance, and I knew it would so hurt his feeling as to accelerate 
 his death. I have told George of the manner in which it has been raised, 
 
 H 2 
 
100 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 and I hope lie will enable me to retu[rn it]. Eeynolds, I find, did not 
 send the £50 after all. I did not know that till very lately ; he wrote 
 [to me of his] desire Keats would draw upon him for that sum. [You] 
 "will oblige me by sending me an account of what is still owing beyond 
 
 what the £100 above mentioned will enable you to pay Will ycu 
 
 .make me a drawing of the spot where Keats is buried.? And the mask, 
 hand and foot will you also send me ? 
 
 " Believe me, my dear sir, 
 " Your truly obliged and sincere friend, 
 
 " John Taylob." 
 
 This letter might easily be taken as in some respects 
 jun warrantable, but an unprejudiced judge would probably- 
 exonerate Mr. Taylor from any underhandedness, as 
 Brown and others persisted at a later date in asserting 
 ■of him. 
 
 As to the request to Severn, begging him at his con- 
 venience, and if not disinclined, to send all particulars of 
 Keats's life and conversation, there is of course nothing to be 
 said, except that Taylor had full right to make it if he saw 
 fit. He had no right to expect compliance, of course, and 
 good taste would prevent his insistence upon his claims to 
 be the biographer of Keats if any of the friends of longer 
 ■standing who had been nearer and dearer to the poet had 
 •announced his intention of writing a biography. But the 
 Tequest, such as it was, and in the circumstances, was certainly 
 not an inexcusable liberty. No doubt Taylor honestly 
 believed that he was as able as any one else to write a good 
 biography or short memoir of the poet whom he thought he 
 knew so much more intimately than he really did ; and in 
 ■any case he may be credited with an unselfish wish to pre- 
 serve everything relating to Keats, and not least effectively 
 by warning Severn, whose happy-go-lucky nature he pro- 
 bably knew, and of whose careless memory he had possibly 
 some acquaintance. But as to his having been requested 
 by several friends to write an account of Keats's life — this 
 is probably mere fiction. It is, at any rate, scarcely likely 
 that any other than his partner, Mr. Hessey, suggested his 
 taking this task upon himself. Again, however, in justice 
 to Taylor, it must be, noted that he alludes to the writing of 
 
SEVERN AFTER KEATS' S DEATH. 101 
 
 a short account only — perhaps, at most, for an article in some 
 important magazine, and possibly only with intent to put 
 together a memoire pour servir, invaluable to the biographer 
 to be. Further, the fact that Keats had in some measure 
 appointed him " a kind of executor," would naturally seem 
 to him to warrant his application to Severn. 
 
 It is pleasant to know that Keats's dear friend, John 
 Hamilton Keynolds, set aside £50 from his not very ample 
 means for the relief of the invalid, if necessary, though, with 
 characteristic carelessness, he omitted to remit the draft. 
 
 As to the news of personal import to Severn, he was 
 greatly encouraged and stimulated by learning that Mr. 
 Hilton, the Academician, believed be had a good chance 
 of obtaining the foreign pension ; and he determined to go- 
 on at once and with all expedition upon his ' Alcibiades ' 
 picture. 
 
 Yet even when several weeks had succeeded the quiet 
 funeral of one of the foremost poets of England, Severn was. 
 unable to recur to the subject of Keats's death without 
 emotion. Writing to his mother to reassure her about his 
 health and way of living, he says : — 
 
 " Thank God, I have perfectly recovered my health, for it had suffered. 
 I am now better and stronger than ever I was. This place, the manner of 
 living, everything seems to agree with me. I don't know how it is, but 
 the example of poor Keats has made me take great care of myself. 
 Including the time spent at my meals, I walk two or three hours every- 
 day, paint eight hours, and read two, or study Italian. Have you now, 
 my dear mother, any cause to fret about my coming here ? If I go on, 
 as I do now, you will not very soon have me back again. Did I not 
 think the good God above would never let me suffer for serving my poor 
 friend? Poor Keats, I cannot get him out of my head, and never shalt 
 out of my heart, never ! I often drop a tear to his memory. You ask 
 me word about him, but he must have been dead and buried before Maria 
 wrote. His case was real consumption. His lungs were entirely destroyed. 
 I cannot write anything about my poor friend's death. I cannot bear to 
 think of it." 
 
102 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 CHAPTEE V. 
 
 Keats-reminiscences— -" The Death of Alcibiades," and other Art-work — 
 Wm, Ewing, Seymour Kirkup, and Sir Geo. Beaumont — Chas. East- 
 lake: — Keatsiana — Letters from Severn and Taylor — Letter from Charles 
 Brown — Brown's reasons for opposing Taylor — Severn gains the travel- 
 ling-pension — Severn and Samuel Eogers — Beminiscences of Shelley — 
 Shelley's influence on Keats — Shelley, Keats, and Severn — The 
 * Adonais ' Preface— Edward Trelawny — Burial of Shelley's ashes. 
 
 In his diaries, his several ' Eeminiscences,' and again 
 and again in his letters, Severn gratefully acknowledges 
 the great change for the better wrought in his fortunes 
 through the circumstance of his having accompanied Keats 
 to Italy, and there so long and unselfishly ministered to 
 him. 
 
 When his friend had been laid in the grave and he found 
 himself alone in Eome, with no friends except Dr. and 
 Mrs. Clark and Mr. Ewing, with painfully uncertain pros- 
 pects, and with scarce any money in hand, his courage 
 almost failed him. At one time he thought of obtaining a 
 loan from one or other of his English friends, for the purpose 
 of returning to London, where he could at any rate support 
 himself by miniature-painting. Then came the strongest 
 disinclination to leave the city which he already loved so 
 well, and which had for him so many tender associations, and 
 where, moreover, he had opportunities of study and self- 
 improvement in Art such as he could not have in London. 
 
 But scarcely had he recovered from the prostration to 
 which for several days after Keats's funeral he succumbed — 
 and for a week at least he seems to have been dangerously 
 weak and feverish, during which period he was constantly 
 visited by Dr. Clark as a friend, and supplied by Mrs. Clark 
 with various delicacies, while he was saved from all other 
 worry and responsibility by the hospital-nurse whom the 
 
KEA TS-REMINISCENCES. 1 03 
 
 kindly physician had obtained for the young painter in 
 whom he was so interested — scarcely had he pulled himself 
 together to renew the struggle of life when he found to his 
 surprise and pleasure that the tide had already turned, and 
 that, with care and tact, he might be able to stay for a time, 
 and possibly prosper sufficiently to reside permanently in 
 Home. 
 
 " After the death of Keats," he says, " niy countrymen in Koine seemed 
 to vie with one another in evincing the greatest kindness towards me. I 
 found myself in the midst of persons who admired and encouraged my 
 beautiful pursuit of painting, in which I was then a very poor student, but 
 with my eyes opening and my soul awakening to a new region of art, and 
 beginning to feel the wings growing for artistic flights I had always been 
 dreaming about. Iu all this, however, there was a solitary drawback; 
 there were few Englishmen at Rome who knew Keats's works, and I could 
 scarcely persuade any one to make the effort to read them, such was the 
 prejudice against him as a poet. . . . * Here lies one whose name was writ 
 in water, and his icorks in milk and water ' — this I was condemned to 
 hear for years repeated, as though it had been a pasquinade ; but I should 
 ■explain it was from those who were not aware that I was the friend of 
 Keats." 
 
 Severn now set himself to work in earnest at his picture. 
 *The Death of Alcibiades,' with which he hoped to win 
 name and fortune, and their first practical manifestation, 
 " the travelling pension." 
 
 He had now gone to reside at No. 18 Via di San Isidoro 
 — though there, at first at any rate, he had no studio. 
 
 With the advent of summer* only one of his acquaint- 
 ances remained behind indifferent to the warnings of the 
 hot weather, Mr. Campbell the sculptor. This gentleman 
 had been left in charge of the studio of Charles Eastlake, 
 
 * Early in May, William Ewing left Rome for England, and Severn gave 
 him the following note to Charles Brown: — "I have great pleasure in 
 introducing to you this gentleman — Mr. William Ewing — for his kind ser- 
 vices to our poor Keats and myself. Altho' we came here strangers to 
 him, he gave us all the attention of an old friend, and that of the most 
 valuable kind. ... I had no other soul to help me. Except Dr. Clark 
 and myself, he saw more of Keats than any one — he will inform you on 
 many points, as yet, too dreadful for me to write. I am still compleatly 
 unnerved when I look upon poor Keats's death ; it still hangs upon me like 
 a horrible dream. You will find this gentleman to possess extraordinary 
 skill as a Sculptor — his works in ivory are to me the most beautiful things 
 of the kind I ever saw." 
 
104 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 who had left Koine with the intention of not returning till 
 the following winter. Acting with brotherly friendli- 
 ness, he installed Severn in the large and almost wholly- 
 unutilized studio. Here 'Alcibiades' proceeded to die 
 dramatically with all due expedition, and all was going well 
 and quietly (particularly as the young painter had received 
 a note from Mr. Howard, the Secretary of the Academy, to- 
 tell him that he had no competitors, there having been no 
 gold-medallists for several years past, and that all he had 
 to do was to send a painting of an historical kind by a 
 specified date), when news came that Eastlake was about to 
 return to Borne. 
 
 " I had to quit, almost ' with my tail between my legs,' for Mr. Campbell 
 was severely reproved for thus letting a stranger into the sanctum sanc- 
 torum ; but in a short time Eastlake became friendly. I returned to my 
 lodging in the S. Isidore, where I was able to finish my ' Alcibiades,' which 
 had been for me a great effort. I had nominally ended my work upon it 
 by the beginning of May, but as there was, as I understood, no hurry for is 
 to be sent off, I kept it by me for a little to rework upon." 
 
 Referring to the comparatively lonely months of March 
 
 and April, he writes in ' Incidents of My Life ' : 
 
 " And, perhaps, I too might have been cut off like Keats, for my health 
 was but very indifferent ; but I had the help and the consolation of my 
 new picture, and was fortunately able to abstract myself with it. Then 
 the early execution of it was imperative, as my future well-being in art — 
 indeed, my very existence — depended thereupon ; so that the necessity of 
 hard and continuous work not only occupied my mind, but fed and nursed 
 my melancholy spirit. Then the magic charms and all the enchantment 
 of spring at Eome soothed me, when I was not painting, into poetic delights. 
 It was a miracle of nature such as I had never even dreamed of; for it 
 seemed to me when I wandered out in the early morning that I could almost 
 see the wild flowers grow — such progress they made in a single day. There 
 was endless pleasure for me in watching the contrasts with the old antique 
 walls and marbles of all this vegetation in its Italian abundance of brilliant 
 freshness and perpetual novelty. All this had the most wonderful effect 
 in restoring me to health, but might not have been effective had not another 
 unlooked-for ally arrested my feeble step and helped both my painting and 
 my loving understanding of nature, for I was soon awakened to a still 
 higher aspect of nature, 'where dawns the high expression of a mind.' 
 The Englishmen and English ladies who now crossed my path were of 
 an order much higher and more intellectual than any I had been ac- 
 quainted with before. There was an ease and elegance in their manners 
 and ideas that most singularly accorded with the beautiful aspects of nature 
 
SEYMOUR KIRKUP AND SIR GEO. BEAUMONT. 105 
 
 that were then constantly disclosing themselves to me. These accom- 
 plished ladies and gentlemen now often crossed my path and offered me 
 their sympathy and friendly aids in all the gentle offices of life, as well 
 as the essential. The death of Keats, although he was unknown, and my 
 devoted friendship, had become a kind of passport to the English in Rome, 
 and I soon found myself in the midst of not only the most polished society, 
 but perhaps the most Christian in the world, I mean in the sense of 
 humanity, of cheerfulness, of living rather for others than ourselves. This 
 was a ' treasure-trove ' to me as a young artist, invaluable, as it was my 
 introduction to my future patrons, and the foundation of those valuable 
 and lasting friendships which not only extended through my first lonely 
 Italian sojourn, but has become the inheritance of my children." 
 
 The chief friend who brought about this change was 
 Seymour Kirkup, to whom Severn had been introduced by 
 William Ewing at Keats's grave on the day of the funeral. 
 He was at once an artist and a most accomplished and 
 excellent man. Moreover, he had the means wherewith to- 
 indulge his love for rare and beautiful things, and he did 
 indulge in a true and generous spirit. 
 
 " To him even more than to Dr. Clark I was indebted for my introduc- 
 tion to the leading English then in Borne, and particularly to Lord and 
 Lady Ruthven, the Countess of Westmoreland, and Lord William Russell, 
 who all delighted me with their love and understanding of art, and who 
 opened to me so many new sources of information and progress. They 
 invited me to charming parties, alfresco dinners (for the season was ad- 
 vancing), rural excursions to the neighbouring villas, to the Campagna, and 
 
 the hill-resorts about Rome Then there were excavations and a 
 
 perpetual round of intellectual novelties, to me the source of all I was 
 aiming at. And when it is considered how great were my gains in thus 
 suddenly coming across numbers of individuals who knew more about 
 art than I did — many of whom, moreover, made me valuable presents 
 of books, prints, casts, &c. — it will be allowed that I was very fortunate. 
 All this was the more agreeable to me as I was conscious that I had 
 achieved little to merit it. . . . By the time of their departure by the 
 end of May I was sufficiently recovered to be able to endure my own 
 society, and even to enjoy my existence in the new delightful symptoms 
 of returning health, and to find my pencil moving gaily and with artistic 
 enthusiasm. ... I stayed a week at Tivoli with Sir George and Lady 
 Beaumont " ( Vide p. 114, post), " and had the pleasure of his conversation 
 the whole time. He was always recurring to the great artistic days 
 which had passed. His accounts of Gainsborough, Romney, Lady 
 Hamilton, Nelson, and so forth, were delightful, but all were made to 
 centre round the pivot of Sir Joshua Reynolds, who was the top of his 
 admiration, both as a man and an artist I used at times stop to> 
 
106 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 regret that poor dear Keats was not alive to participate in these scenes. 
 What a world would have been open to him. Boy-poet as he was, he 
 
 would have soon risen into the philosopher His illness aDd death 
 
 ■were pioneered by despair. He was hurried down a sea of troubles to 
 ■death." 
 
 Severn contentedly enough made up his mind to a sum- 
 mer in Eome. Several of his friends urged him not to do 
 ;so foolish a thing as to remain throughout the hot months ; 
 but he had not the wherewithal to take up summer quarters, 
 and, with his very uncertain prospects, did not care to 
 saddle himself with even the least burdensome of debts. 
 Before the end of July, however, he recognised the advisa- 
 bility of a change to the neighbouring hill-country. Before 
 he left Borne, he wrote to Charles Brown : 
 
 " You see on the approach of the hot and dangerous weather I shall be 
 •obliged to go away, and that without placing a stone on poor Keats's grave. 
 All his papers I have sent to you, packed for safety in a box of divers 
 things belonging to my old friend and master Mr. Bond. I chose this from 
 ■many as the safest way — they will arrive in London about August or 
 September. Mr. Taylor has written me of his intention to write some 
 remembrances of our Keats. This is a kind thought of his, and I reverence 
 this good man — nothing can be more interesting than to have the beautiful 
 •character of Keats described and appreciated. If it can be made known 
 to the English, his memory will be cherished by them, not more for his 
 :genius than for his English nature. I begin to think of him without pain 
 — all the harsh horror of his death is fast subsiding from my mind. Some- 
 times a delightful glance of his life about the time when I first knew him 
 will take possession of me and keep me speculating on and on to some 
 passage in the ' Endymion.' (I, am fortunate to have a copy of this— it is 
 Dr. Clark's — the last also.) Here I find many admirers — aye, real ones — 
 •of his poetry. This is a very great pleasure to me. I have many most 
 agreeable conversations about him — but that only with classical scholars. 
 The ' Lamia ' is the greatest favourite. I have been most sadly harassed 
 about my picture for the Royal Academy, for this reason — I have received 
 notice to send it by the 10th of August. Now, this is a month sooner 
 than I expected ... so that I have sent it unfinished without any delay. 
 Now, this has been an unfortunate point, more particularly as I am ill, out 
 of spirits, and friendless — most of the kind fellows here have gone to Naples 
 ■or elsewhere — so that I am left to brood over the loss of poor Keats's 
 •company, and above all his advice. 
 
 " You will recollect, my dear Brown, a mention of me (not with the 
 •greatest kindness or charity), at Mr. Hilton's house. Keats spoke several 
 times of this with very great pain, from the fear that something of the 
 isame spirit might keep back my pension. He told me it was one of the 
 
LETTERS FROM SEVERN AND TAYLOR. 107 
 
 meanest said things he ever knew, and at the same time made me promise 
 that I would explain to Mr. Taylor the whole affair — that I would write 
 in such a manner as to persuade Mr. Taylor to use his greatest influence in 
 luy behalf with Mr. Hilton. He said : ' I am sure Hilton will take up 
 your case on my account. Now promise me you will do this. I have been 
 long brooding over it, and think this damned H. will keep you without 
 your pension — or try to do so — I know he will — so that this cursed dying 
 •of mine will have been to your loss.' This was but a short time before his 
 death. I have written to Mr. Taylor about my present concern, but not of 
 the affair past — I have still thought it better not mentioned — nor would 
 I say about it now, but it seems hard I must run the risk of my picture's 
 non-arrival in time from the notice sent me by Hilton. Keats foresaw most 
 keenly, and his words come strong upon me. [Now] How, my dear Brown, 
 shall I do in this ? . . . Above all things pray answer [paper torn"] letters. 
 Tell me how the sad finish of poor Keats affected his enemies— tell me 
 about his friends — tell me about Miss B. I have been once or twice almost 
 writing to her. Only think, my dear Brown, 1 have known nothing from 
 England since poor Keats's death — O, yes, one very kind letter from Mr. 
 Taylor, which I answered. Haslam does not write me. ... I have like- 
 wise got in [hand] a small whole-length of my poor Keats ; it is from a 
 lecollection of him at your house, I think the last time I saw him there — 
 he was reading, the book on his knee." 
 
 Late in August he heard from Mr. Taylor about his 
 missing ' Alcibiades,' and concerning certain Keats details. 
 
 " On the subject of a gravestone for our poor friend, I said something in 
 a letter to Dr. Clark, which was to serve as an introduction of Mr. Horace 
 Smith to him, but the dread of being in Borne in the hot weather will 
 probably prevent Mr. Smith from delivering it till Xmas, and therefore 
 this letter will possibly arrive the first. I find by your letter to Mr. Haslam 
 that you have designed a tomb in the form of a Grecian altar, with a lyre, 
 •&c. This is said to be executing, I think, by some English sculptor, but 
 you want an inscription. I can conceive none better than our poor friend's 
 melancholy sentiment, ' Here lies one whose name was writ in water.' It 
 is very simple and affecting, and tells so much of the story that none need 
 be told. Neither name nor date is requisite. These will be given in his 
 life by his biographer. So, unless something else is determined on, let this 
 ■line stand alone. I foresee that it will be as clear an indication to posterity 
 as the plainest, every-day inscription that one may find in Westminster 
 Abbey. I imagine the expense will not be great at Borne. You must 
 excuse me that I have not replied sooner to your letter on this latter sub- 
 ject. I am harassed beyond my strength by a multitude of different 
 avocations which not only take np all my time, but rob me of all inclina- 
 tion to write even a letter. I shall be very glad to receive the portrait, &c, 
 -of poor Keats. In the course of the winter I hope to get on with the 
 Memoir." 
 
108 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 When he wrote this, Taylor had quite made up his mind 
 to be Keats's biographer, and clearly relied upon Severn's 
 collaboration. Severn, however, with wise and generous 
 discretion, instead of yielding to Taylor's importunities, 
 thought of the likeliest course which Keats would wish, and 
 sent the most valuable literary remains to Brown. This 
 and other episodes are alluded to in the latter's letter, the 
 first part of which is occupied with what the writer has to 
 say concerning the missing picture, and Severn's fluctuating 
 chances in the matter of the " travelling pension." 
 
 " As affairs stand," he concludes, " look to the worst! Believe that your 
 pension is lost, and if the contrary happens to he the case, it will be a joy. 
 And supposing it to he lost, let it not fret you. Take heart, and laugh at 
 an irreparable misfortune. I would do so were it my own case, better than 
 if it were my friend's. Place your regret chiefly on the disappointment of 
 others, and, surely, with your abilities, you can put your shoulder cheer- 
 fully to the wheel, and retrieve the loss. I am a fit one to give you comfort 
 on this score. Over and over again have I to Keats and others lamented 
 your reliance on a band of Academicians, where there is nothing but envy, 
 jealousy, intrigues, and squabbles, in preference to the pursuit of the art on 
 your own account, independently, and at freedom from all conventional 
 laws. The English like to be flattered, but in fact they are not enthu- 
 siasts in art, — they neither understand it, nor are they generous enough to 
 reward a man during his life. Can you not read a lesson in the fate of bur 
 unhappy Keats ? The English are too proud and selfish to acknowledge 
 living merit in art and literature. If you continue to study portraits, both 
 in miniature and in oil, crowds will be led by vanity to your door, and you 
 be rich and at ease in your mind ; but if you were to paint a work like the 
 ' Transfiguration,' lo ! now — you must be poor in purse, and (what is worse) 
 poor in spirit, and kick your heels in a great man's antechamber, and be 
 fevered thro' your life with broils and anxieties. Look to facts. Who ha& 
 succeeded in historical painting since Sir J. Reynolds ? None, save West, 
 and he most undeservedly. I repeat, the English understand it not. 
 Think of this, my dear Severn — think of the choice you are now to make. 
 Do not let hopes destroy your happiness., What was Sir T. Lawrence's 
 advice ? Truly, it was wise. You are now the best miniature-painter we 
 have. This is no compliment ; you know it yourself. Still, you need not 
 debar yourself from the pursuit of the historical, — only make portraits your 
 sheet-anchor for profit, and when your purse is swollen, sit down for awhile 
 to the other. I could write a quire full on this theme — but enough. 
 
 " lith Aug. — If my memory does not deceive me, I have sent three 
 letters since I received your last; one of them had a page filled by Leigh 
 Hunt; none of them, however, is of late date. Mr. Ewing has not yet 
 called, nor sent the letter from you which, 1 understand, is in his hands ; I 
 
LETTER FROM CHARLES BROWN. 109 
 
 shall be glad to see him. You asked Mr. Taylor to consult with me about 
 Keats's epitaph — or, I believe, to let you know what epitaph I wished. He 
 did not allow me to see that letter for a long time ; I then talked to him 
 about it, and he behaved as if he thought it was no concern of mine, 
 changing the topic as soon as he could. It was not till the other day that 
 I discovered he bears me no goodwill for claiming, in return for MSS. and 
 information, a sight of his memoir before it went to press. I confess I 
 could not trust him entirely ; now and then he is a mere bookseller — 
 somewhat vain of his talents, and consequently self-willed. My anxiety 
 for poor Keats's fame compelled me to make this request; for, in my opinion, 
 Taylor neither comprehended him nor his poetry. I shall always be the 
 first to acknowledge Taylor's kindness to Keats ; but towards me his con- 
 duct has been ungracious and even unmannerly. Eeynolds is the secret 
 spring ; it is wished he should shine as the dear friend of poor Keats — (at 
 least I suspect so) — when the fact is, he was no dear friend to Keats, nor 
 did Keats think him so.* This, however, might be borne, but there are 
 other points where I fear Taylor may do Keats an injustice — not know- 
 ingly, but from the want of knowing his character. He has sent no answer 
 to my yesterday's note. Either by the next or the next but one post I 
 will write again, and give you my ideas of an epitaph for our beloved 
 Keats. The health of every one of your family is excellent, but they are 
 sadly perplexed about this E.A. business. Mr. Bond sends his remem- 
 brances, and desired me to say his brother is in better health, and will soon 
 arrive here from Paris. Richards is well, and asks continually about you ; 
 I shall insist upon his writing. I thank you for intrusting me with Keats's 
 papers — the sight of them will renew many painful thoughts. My next- 
 door neighbours are quite well ; Miss Brawne had been growing (I thought 
 alarmingly) thin, but of late she has looked more cheerful and better. I 
 delivered your messages to them, and they sent some of the same nature. 
 Do not imagine I am in a peevish mood about Taylor ; to give my aid to a 
 thing of so momentous a description as the fame of Keats without being 
 satisfied on every point is more than I can do in duty to the memory of 
 the dearest friend I ever had. Still I promised Taylor my aid, provided I 
 might be allowed to approve or condemn in particular passages, which he 
 assented to, and praised my solicitude ; but lately I have heard that having 
 got the chief things from me, he resolved to laugh at my opinion. I am 
 afraid it will be made a job — a mere trading job — and that I will lend no 
 hand to, further than what I have done. You must feel with me that I 
 should be culpable, as Keats's friend, even to run a risk. If Taylor choose, 
 
 * This is a new light upon the friendship of Keats and Reynolds. Brown 
 seems to have been prejudiced against Reynolds, and so may have written 
 rashly : on the other hand, he was not the man to hint at disagreements 
 where none existed. If he wrote with assured knowledge, there need be no 
 further regrets that Reynolds did not undertake the biography of Keats. 
 The general drift of evidence, however, points to some misapprehension on 
 the part of Brown. 
 
110 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 on my conditions (which he himself has approved of) my assistance will be- 
 given most willingly. I heard yesterday that Clark is thinking of writing 
 a memoir — to tell the truth, I would rather join him, hut at present I am 
 (conditionally) hound.* God bless you, my dear Severn. 
 
 " Yours truly, 
 
 " Chas. Brown." 
 
 On September 19th Severn replied to this and Brown's 
 next letter (August 21st). 
 
 " Why, my dear Brown, what sad affair is this ? I know not what, to 
 say in it, except this, that you are the only one to write Keats's Memoir — - 
 at least to describe his character. I have the greatest respect for the talent 
 and good heart of Mr. Taylor — his exertions for poor Keats when all was 
 hopeless — the publication of his books, &c, set him down as a most noble- 
 friend — [that] he loved Keats is certain, to have made all these sacrifices, 
 but did not feel the delicacy of his mind. I hope and trust you will recon- 
 cile this dispute. It seems to me your seeing the memoir is the only way 
 to compleat it — that Mr. Taylor's and your own idea of Keats's character 
 will be compleat, but certainly not one without the other. I would say 
 consult Bichards too — he was inferior to no one in the estimation of Keats, 
 He will give some valuable scraps. Keats's genius and character must 
 make a most beautiful book, as a book alone — not in making a compleat 
 poet, or even comparing him to others, but in describing and tracing the 
 progress of Genius from nature to art, and then to their union. I can see 
 all this with immense pleasure. I can recollect him before he had that- 
 delicate perception for art, when he talked and felt only nature — and I can 
 recollect his knowledge of art to have been greater than any one I ever 
 knew. Then his English nature is a subject most grateful. I don't know 
 whether to prefer his heart or his soul — but pardon me ; I can only think 
 of him and paint him. You must not ask me for contributions for this- 
 work, except it be from my painting. I am not master of words to show 
 what I feel or think. I recollect a point which may be known to you, 
 perhaps. Keats mentioned to me many times in our voyage his desire to 
 write the story of Sabrina, and to have connected it with some points in 
 the English history and character. He would sometimes brood over it with 
 immense enthusiasm, and recite the story from Milton's ' Comus ' in a 
 manner that I will remember to the end of my days. Do you [know] th& 
 sonnet beginning — 
 
 « Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art ! ' 
 He wrote this down in the ship — it is one of his most beautiful things. I 
 will send it, if you have it not— at present I have lent the book in which 
 he wrote it, or I would send it. Why how singular that none of you can 
 lament out his Epitaph. I agree with you that more should [be] written 
 
 * It is not clear whether Brown wrote Clark or OlarJee, but his 
 allusion is to the memoir projected by Charles Cowden Clarke. 
 
BROWS SEASONS FOB OPPOSING TAYLOB. Ill 
 
 than the line he desired. This morning my friend and myself visited poor 
 Keats's grave. It is still covered with grass and flowers, and remains quiet 
 and undisturbed. The place where he lies is one of the most romantic I 
 know — but I won't send you my bungling descriptions, but I will send a 
 small picture of it. On our return home I thought of another ' record' to 
 him — a Greek seat, with his solitary lyre standing against it, but I will 
 draw it. You see this is a seat vacant, such as the Greeks used in their 
 [paper torn]. It would say— Here is his seat and his lyre, but [paper 
 torn] not beneath. Tell me how you like this. I am delighted with it.' 
 
 A week later Brown wrote again to Severn, and still 
 without good news of the missing picture. The main 
 interest in the letter is what it has to say concerning the 
 vexed question as to Keats's biographer. 
 
 " When I mentioned to you my fears about Mr. Taylor's memoir, I 
 
 omitted to make known the original cause of those fears. It was this.. 
 
 Immediately on receipt of your letter announcing poor Keats's death, 
 
 almost in the same newspapers where there was a notice of his death, even 
 
 before Mrs. Brawne's family and myself had got our mourning, in those 
 
 very newspapers was advertised ' speedily will be published, a biographical 
 
 memoir of the late John Kelts, &c.,' and I, among others, was applied to 
 
 by Reynolds to collect with all haste, papers, letters, and so on, in order 
 
 to assist Mr. Taylor. This indecent bustle over (as it were) the newly 
 
 covered grave of my dear friend shocked me excessively. I told Mr. Taylor 
 
 it looked as if his friends had been collecting information about his life in 
 
 expectation of his death. This, indeed, was the fact. I believe I spoke 
 
 warmly, and probably gave offence. However, as I was jealous of my 
 
 own feelings upon such a subject, I took the precaution to sound those of 
 
 Hunt, Dilke, and Richards, who were all equally hurt with myself at such 
 
 an indecorous haste. I then came to this conclusion, that Messrs. Taylor 
 
 and Reynolds, who could show such a want of feeling at such a moment, 
 
 ought not to be confided in by me unreservedly, and since I came to that 
 
 conclusion, I have had cause to believe myself correct. I will not consent 
 
 to be a party in a bookseller's job. Perhaps it may turn out otherwise, 
 
 but in justice to the memory of Keats, I dare not run a risk. Mr. Taylor 
 
 expected to be trusted implicitly, and takes dudgeon. Now, on such a 
 
 point I know of none whom I could trust implicitly. He says no one 
 
 understood Keats's character so well as himself; if so, I who knew him 
 
 tolerably well, and others of his friends, greatly mistook him, judging from 
 
 what has dropped from Mr. Taylor — for he is one from whom things drop 
 
 — he cannot utter them boldly and honestly, at least he never did to me, 
 
 and I have heard Keats say the same of him. What I have written, I 
 
 have written, and I leave you to judge if you think me right or wron". I 
 
 rejoice you sent me the papers, and under the circumstances, I think you 
 
 will rejoice likewise. He is welcome, according to my promise, to any 
 
 information I can afford, provided he, according to his promise, allows me 
 
112 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEItN. 
 
 a voice on the occasion. In my opinion, Taylor would rather decline the 
 information. If you differ from me in my claim of having a voice, still I 
 have Dilke, Eichards, and Hunt on my side. Hunt has some poems, &c, 
 of Keats, and offers them unreservedly to me, stipulating, however, that 
 Taylor must not be possessed of them without the memoirs passing under 
 my eye. Why should it be denied to me ? Any sort of hesitation will 
 make the business suspicious. Hunt was very kind to Keats last summer, 
 and I cannot forget it. If Keats could not like his wife, that is nothing to 
 
 the purpose 
 
 " I had written thus far on 21st, expecting every minute a knock by 
 Hunt at the door with an epitaph for Keats. He did not come till the 
 evening, and then with an apology, promising, however, to let me have it 
 on the following post-day (Friday Jast), and then he again disappointed 
 me. I can wait no longer, but am resolved to send you this letter without 
 it. Why, you will ask, set Hunt about this affair ? The truth is, I have 
 tried, but can do nothing for the epitaph to my own satisfaction, and 
 Hunt is one, if I am not mistaken, who could word it with feeling and 
 elegance. He has sadly disappointed me, but the trouble he is in must 
 be his excuse. I like your idea of the lyre with broken strings. Mr. 
 Taylor sets his face against that, and against any words except what 
 Keats himself desired to be put on his tombstone, viz. : ' Here lies one 
 whose name was writ in water.' This I contend is scarcely proper, insomuch 
 as an epitaph must necessarily be considered as the act of the deceased's 
 friends and not of the deceased himself. Still, in obedience to his (Keats) 
 will, I would have his own words engraven there, and not his name, letting 
 the stranger read the cause of his friend's placing such words as ' Here 
 lies one, &c.,' somewhat in the following manner : — ' This grave contains 
 all that was mortal of a young English poet, who, on his death-bed, in 
 bitter anguish at the neglect of his countrymen, desired these words to be 
 engraven on his tomb-stone : " Hebe lies one whose name was writ in 
 wateb." ' * Something expressive of this, and surmounted by your 
 emblem of a Grecian lyre, I think would be proper. But mind, I am not 
 satisfied with my wording, and therefore pray delay the epitaph for a 
 while. If, however, you are of the same opinion as Mr. Taylor, I give up 
 mine instantly. I find it a difficult subject. Two or three days ago 
 Eichards called. He and family are very well. He was in the midst of a 
 long letter to you " 
 
 Eyen by the end of September there was no word of the 
 missing picture. At the beginning of October he heard 
 from William Ewing : a long letter full of pleasant gossip 
 
 of temporary interest. One sentence may be quoted : " I 
 
 called with your letter on Mr. Brown, at Hampstead, who 
 
 * Many years later Brown regretted he had even to this extent advised 
 anything beyond strict adherence to Keats's own words. (Vide his lnttpr 
 •of 26th November, 1836, post, p. 178.) V 
 
SEVEBN GAINS THE TRAVELLING-PENSION. 113 
 
 received me very kindly. I have dined with him twice ; he 
 appears a very friendly man. He procured me a sight of 
 your miniature of poor Mr. Keats, and I really think it the 
 best performance I ever saw. It is admirable." 
 
 When September and the greater part of October had 
 passed, and there were still no comforting tidings about the 
 unfortunate canvas which was to have won for the artist the 
 coveted travelling-pension, of which he stood in urgent need, 
 Severn began to lose hope either of the picture turning up 
 at all, or of his success with the Council, though now and 
 again he solaced himself with the belief that " friends at 
 Court " would accomplish what his own efforts would never 
 achieve. About the end of the month he wrote to his 
 sister Sarah : " Tell father I have heard in answer to Lady 
 Westmorland's letter to Sir Thos. Lawrence, and most 
 favourably of the Council towards myself. She says I am 
 sure of the most kind treatment. I have just discovered I 
 have the Marquis of Anglesea speaking for me, and many 
 other powerful individuals, so that [in any event] I shall be 
 
 no loser I am now occupied on a miniature of Lady 
 
 Westmorland, and for the finishing of it I am going with her 
 ladyship to Civita Vecchia, about thirty miles from Borne." 
 At last one day a search at the Eoyal Academy was 
 ordered, " and a tin case, all bent double and without any 
 direction or intimation as to whom it belonged, was found. 
 It was opened, and lo, my ' Dying Alcibiades ' ! " 
 
 The Council had postponed its decision till the end of 
 November, and no doubt at the final meeting the vicis- 
 situdes of the picture and the artist's sore tribulation about 
 its fate — backed up by the influential recommendations to 
 which allusion has already been made — had distinct effect in 
 bringing the Academicians to a decision altogether favour- 
 able to Severn. They not only awarded him the pension of 
 £130 annually for three years, and intimated that it would 
 date from the 1st (of the preceding) August, but also 
 remitted a draft in payment of the sum he had expended 
 in going to Eome. It was a welcome Christmas card, for 
 he received it on December 25th. 
 
 i 
 
114 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 But before leaving this ever-memorable year of 1821, 
 there are one or two important things in Severn's life to 
 chronicle. As far as may be, the words of the artist's 
 Journals shall be given intact. 
 
 " In the spring I became acquainted with a person of great interest to 
 me ; this was the famous amateur artist, Sir George Beaumont. I was 
 making an oil sketch at the Capitol from Rubens' ' Romulus and Remus,' 
 and doing it with outrageous boldness that I might try to rectify my 
 great want. He spoke to me and admired my daub most indulgently, 
 and told me who he was, and talked charmingly of Sir Joshua Reynolds 
 and his contemporaries, all of whom he had known personally. He told 
 me about Reynolds' art, how he painted, how many hours, and indeed 
 everything I asked him, and finished by inviting me to dine with him, 
 telling me that he expected Mr. Samuel Eogers amongst his guests. I was 
 as greatly pleased at this kind compliment as I was at the manner of it. 
 Although our acquaintance was so sudden, and without the least introduc- 
 tion, he spoke with so much ease, and had such a lively, benevolent expres- 
 sion of countenance, that I was lost to the value of the incident in the actual 
 fascination of it. At dinner the subject of Keats's death and misfortunes 
 were discussed, and I became aware for the first time that these were very 
 well known, and the continued source of conversation, although both 
 Keats and myself were personally unknown. Mr. Rogers ventured to say 
 that he believed he had been twice applied to by Keats for money, and 
 that there were so many of these needy poetic aspirants that he could 
 only shut his door. This made me flare up, as I knew it was a falsehood, 
 or a mistake ; so I asked him more particularly, but he stuck to his point 
 that it was Keats himself; and then I opened upon him, and indirectly 
 showed him the slanderous way of talking he was indulging in, and that 
 Keats was not only far removed from such ' uncanny acts,' as he called 
 them, but also that he had no occasion, having been in possession of a 
 small competence ; and I finished by expressing my regret that one poet 
 should thus speak of another, and appealed to Sir George Beaumont's 
 generosity, who had that very day spoken to me at the Capitol and 
 invited me to dine only because I was also a 'pittore.' Mr. Rogers felt 
 the reproof, made me ample apology on the ground of carelessness, and 
 became ever after a most attached friend." 
 
 Elsewhere Severn gives another account of this now cele- 
 brated meeting, effectually convincing even the staunchest 
 of Eogers's admirers, who affected to discredit the truth of 
 the rumours which spread abroad concerning his disparaging 
 remarks about Keats.* 
 
 * In 'The Vicissitudes of Keats's Fame' (vide The Atlantic Monthly 
 for 1863). " 
 
SAMUEL ROGERS: SHELLEY. 115 
 
 "I soon discovered," adds Severn, "that it was the principle of Mr. 
 Rogers' sarcastic wit not only to sacrifice all truth to it, but even all his 
 friends, and that he did not care to know any who would not allow them- 
 selves to be abused for the purpose of lighting up his breakfast with 
 sparkling wit, though not quite, indeed, at the expense of the persons 
 then present. I well remember, on one occasion afterwards, Mr. Rogers 
 was entertaining us with a volley of sarcasms upon a disagreeable lawyer, 
 who made pretensions to knowledge and standing not to be borne ; on this 
 occasion the old poet went on, not only to the end of the breakfast, but to 
 the announcement of the very man himself on an accidental visit, and 
 then, with a bland smile and a cordial shake of the band, he said to him, 
 ■' My dear fellow, we have all been talking about you up to this very 
 minute ; ' and looking at his company still at table, and with a significant 
 wink, he, witb extraordinary adroitness and experienced tact, repeated 
 many of the good things, reversing the meaning of them, and giving us 
 -the enjoyment of the double entendre. The visitor was charmed, nor 
 even dreamed of the ugliness of his position. This incident gave me a 
 rpainful and repugnant impression of Mr. Eogers, yet no doubt it was 
 after the manner of his time, and such as had been the fashion in 
 Walpole's and Johnson's days. 
 
 " I should be unjust to the venerable poet not to add that, notwith- 
 standing what is here related of him, he oftentimes showed himself the 
 generous and noble-hearted man. I think that in all my long acquaintance 
 with him he evinced a kind of indirect regret that he had commenced 
 with me in such an ugly attack on dear Keats, whose fame, when I went 
 to England, in 1838, was not only well established, but was increasing 
 from day to day ; and Mr. Rogers was often at the pains to tell me so, and 
 to relate the many histories of poets who had been less fortunate than 
 Keats." 
 
 It was at the first advent of winter, and at a time when 
 Severn had begun to fear that the fame of Keats, such as it 
 was, was about to be eclipsed, that he was deeply affected 
 by Shelley's magnificent tribute to his fellow-poet and by 
 the unexpected dedicatory eulogy of himself. At that time 
 he knew little of Shelley's work, and did noi take any real 
 interest in the poet, for, like most of his contemporaries 
 who were aware of Shelley's existence, he was prejudiced 
 against "the atheistical writer and licentious man," as it 
 was the vogue to call the rarest singer of the age. 
 
 In his annotations on some MS. selections from the 
 
 ' Adonais,' after the lines — 
 
 " Why linger, why turn back, why shrink, my heart ? 
 Thy hopes are gone before : from all things here 
 They have departed ; thou should'st now depart " — 
 
 i 2 
 
116 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 he writes :* 
 
 " I first became known to Shelley in 1817, through Leigh Hunt. The 
 poet's fine presence is still vividly before me : his tall, elegant, but 
 slender figure: his countenance painfully intellectual, inasmuch as it 
 showed [traces of his] struggle with humanity, and betrayed the abstract 
 gift of a high mind in little relation with the world. His restless blue 
 eyes seemed to dwell more on the inward than the outward aspect of 
 nature. His manner, aristocratic though gentle, aided his personal 
 beauty. Fine, classical features, luxuriant brown hair, and a slightly 
 ruddy complexion, combined with his unconsciousness of his attractive 
 appearance, added to his fine exterior. He expressed himself in subdued 
 accents, which commanded attention from their select mental character." 
 
 The remark about Shelley's " classical " features, and still 
 more that about his " subdued accents " in conversation, 
 afford interesting evidence at first hand to set against the 
 statements that have been made as to the irregularity of 
 the poet's features, and as to his shrill and almost strident 
 voice. 
 
 " The common charge against him of moral unworthiness,'' Severn 
 resumes, " I cannot but think was very unjust. But it was the tendency 
 of the time, and the charge attached itself to all liberals who strove to 
 fight with the conservative party. I remember with pleasure a remark 
 on Shelley's cruel fate made me by the late Lord Chancellor, Lord St. 
 Leonards, that he thought Lord Eldon was in error in taking away 
 Shelley's children, when he could so easily have conciliated the fond 
 father through various literary men — whereas the act of deprivation drove 
 the poet to utter despair, who finished by attacking religion itself instead 
 of the Chancellor. I can judge clearly on this, as Shelley, in our first 
 interview, went out of his way to attack me on my Christian creed.f 
 He repeated to Leigh Hunt the plan of a poem he was about to write, 
 being a comparison of the Blessed Saviour with a mountebank, whose 
 tricks he identified with the miracles. I was shocked and disturbed, and 
 breaking in upon his offensive detail, I exclaimed, ' That the fact of the 
 greatest men having been Christians during the Christian period placed 
 the religion far above such low ridicule.' Shelley immediately denied 
 this fact, and we at once began enumerating on our fingers the great men 
 who were Christians, and the few who were not. When we got to 
 
 * In later life Severn once stated to Lord Houghton that he was 
 introduced to Keats by Leigh Hunt in 1817 ; but he was confusing that 
 incident with his introduction to Shelley. 
 
 t Shelley, then quite a youth, was in the habit at that time of saying 
 things calculated to shock unwary hearers. Severn accepted all he said 
 in dead earnest, and judged accordingly. 
 
SHELLEY'S INFLUENCE ON KEATS. 117 
 
 Shakespeare he attempted to deny the great poet's belief, and quoted the 
 sailor in ' Measure for Measure.' My counter quotations were from the 
 utterances of Portia, Hamlet, Isabella, and numerous others ; so that 
 Leigh Hunt and Keats declared I had the best of the argument — where- 
 upon Shelley declared that he would study the subject and write an 
 essay upon it. I am not aware if he ever wrote that essay, but among 
 his posthumous works there is an unfinished essay on Christianity, of the 
 most ardent and beautiful nature, showing his belief and expatiating on 
 the sublimity of Christ and the Creator. I do not know when this was 
 ■written, but most certainly no one but Shelley could have written it, and 
 it proves to me that his assumed paganism was a monomania — an 
 assumption borne out at a later date by the 'Young England' party 
 declaring Shelley to be the only religious poet of the age ! The transition 
 is immense, but there cannot be a doubt that ' Young England ' was 
 right, as now every one thinks so. The ' Prometheus Unbound ' was ex- 
 plained to me by Mr. Gladstone as a Christian poem, if but the name 
 were changed; and I have met several distinguished clergymen, both 
 Protestant and Catholic, who have expressed the same opinion, and even 
 that the greater belief in the Christian religion now apparent was owing 
 to the poetry of Shelley — indeed, one Papist went so far as to infer the 
 conversion of England through it." 
 
 In surprising discrepancy with these remarks are some 
 written at an earlier date in the MS. ' Incidents of My Life.' 
 
 " About four [eight] months after his [Keats's] death I received from 
 Shelley the beautiful poem to Keats's memory, ' Adonais.' Great and 
 touching as it was, and filled, as I thought, with greater beauties than 
 Milton's ' Lycidas,' yet I could not be reconciled to the author when I 
 reflected that in so great a degree he had been one of those friends who 
 had most helped to take away the means of hope from Keats, when 
 despair was so shortly to kill him. Shelley, in his poem, is wholly 
 unconscious of what I mean, nor do I think even now after thirty-nine - 
 years are there many who would comprehend what I feel." 
 
 It is a pity that all readers of Severn's words are also left 
 in ignorance of his exact meaning. The most likely in- 
 ference is that Keats's faith in the Christian religion had 
 been undermined by Shelley, and that in his last year or 
 two of mental and bodily anguish his sufferings were 
 greatly increased by a kind of nostalgia for the faith he 
 had left behind, a longing for the old believing prayers, 
 the answering God — even for the symbols of worship. On 
 the other hand, Severn's solemn emphasis (all things con- 
 sidered) does not seem quite natural from him ; while the 
 
118 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEEN. 
 
 closing sentence would seem to indicate some meaning less: 
 obvious than the above inference. It is to the last degree 
 unlikely that Keats sheered off from Christianity at the 
 suggestion or under the influence of Shelley, or, indeed, of 
 any man ; moreover, the two poets were never intimate, and 
 Keats was, as we know, unmoved by his comrade's eloquent 
 denunciations of Christianity, whether in conversation, 
 prose-essays, 'Queen Mab,' or 'The Kevolt of Islam.' 
 Probably there is nothing behind Severn's remark, beside 
 the natural inference : and in all likelihood it was inspired 
 by his regrets that Keats did not share to the full his own 
 enthusiastic sentiment for the Christian faith, and his 
 strong prejudice against Shelley's general views — a pre- 
 judice that affected the man, in his estimation, only a degree 
 less. Moreover, he changed or modified his views about 
 Shelley several times in his life. 
 
 But it may readily be imagined how keen was his gratifi- 
 cation when he received the first copy of the ' Adonais,' and 
 with it the following letter from the author : — 
 
 " Pisa, 
 "Nov. 29th, 1821. 
 " Deak Sie, 
 
 " I send you the elegy on poor Keats — and I wish it were better 
 worth your acceptance. You will see by the preface that it was written 
 before I could obtain any particular account of his last moments ; all that 
 I still know, was communicated to me by a friend who had derived his 
 information from Colonel Finch ; I have ventured to express, as I felt, 
 the respect and admiration which your conduct towards him demands. 
 In spite of his transcendent genius, Eeats never was, nor ever will be, a 
 popular poet ; and the total neglect and obscurity in which the astonish- 
 ing remnants of his mind still lie, was hardly to be dissipated by a writer, 
 who, however he may differ from Keats in more important qualities, ac 
 least resembles him in that accidental one, a want of popularity. 
 
 " I have little hope, therefore, that the poem I send you will excite any 
 attention, nor do I feel assured that a critical notice of his writings would 
 find a single reader. But for these considerations, it had been my 
 intention to have collected the remnants of his compositions, and to have 
 published them with a Life and Criticism. Has he left any poems or 
 writings of whatsoever kind, and in whose possession are they ? Perhaps 
 you would oblige me by information on this point. Many thanks for the 
 picture you promise me : I shall consider it among the most sacred relics 
 of the past. For my part, 1 little expected, when I last saw Keats at my 
 
SHELLEY, KEATS, AND SEVERN. 119 
 
 friend Leigh Hunt's, that I should survive him. Should you ever pass 
 through Pisa, I hope to have the pleasure of seeing you, and of cultivating 
 an acquaintance into something pleasant, begun under such melancholy 
 auspices. Aocept, my dear sir, the assurance of my highest esteem, and' 
 believe me, 
 
 "Your most sincere and faithful servant, 
 
 " Percy B. Shelley." 
 
 It is interesting to learn from this letter that Shelley at 
 one time thought of writing a Life of Keats, and that, by 
 his inquiry as to the destination of the literary remains, the 
 idea was one that really occupied his mind. 
 
 A little later Severn wrote to Brown concerning the 
 ' Adonais.' 
 
 " Some, 
 "Jan. 1st, 1822. 
 
 "I have received a copy of the Monody on Keats. I find many 
 beauties in it, but is it not a pity so much beauty should be scattered 
 about, without the balancing of lights and shades, or the oppositions of 
 colours ? In this poem there is such a want of repose, — you are con- 
 tinually longing to know what he will be at. It gave me great pleasure 
 as a tribute to poor Keats's memory. The picture of poor Keats is in a 
 fair way. I have put in your accurate drawing, but I seem to want that 
 beautiful cast of him there is in London. I cannot finish without, and 
 have named it amongst many things to be sent out to me. The grave- 
 stone is advanced, but not up yet. I cannot well recollect the Greek 
 Lyre, so that they wait for the Drawings from London. I liked the 
 Inscription much, and it shall be done exactly. I have some hair of our 
 poor Keats, and have been waiting for a friend to bring it to London. I 
 have thought of a little conceit, as a present to poor Miss Brawne — to make 
 a Broach in form of my Greek Lyre, and make the strings of poor Keats's 
 
 hair, but I cannot find any workman to do it I shall not send a 
 
 drawing of poor Keats I intend for you, but reserve it until I have the 
 happiness to meet you." 
 
 In this connection there may be added here another 
 " Keats " letter, though it was not sent to Brown till 
 nearly ten months later. 
 
 "Borne, 
 " Oct. 26th, 1822. 
 ". ... I am just about putting up the grave-stone to> our Keats. 
 This delay has been occasioned by the want of the drawings of the Greek 
 Lyre. I could not proceed without them — they are accurate outlines I 
 made from the beautiful Lyre in the Museum of London, and they have at 
 last arrived. I am sorry, my dear Brown, that you are not here with me 
 
120 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 to share this deep-thinking office. I would have been gratified, for I 
 still long to talk with some one friend about our poor Keats. Yesterday I 
 visited his grave, which is still covered with Flowers and Grass. I was in 
 company with some German Artists and Poets — they seemed much affected 
 with my recital of Keats's fate — and of Shelley's too. 
 
 " This stone is to have simply the Greek Lyre, with half the strings 
 not tied. On the upper part will be a bit of Oak and Myrtle, and under, 
 his name, the date when he died, and his age. I say it is to have these, 
 but it is only my own idea. To say the truth, I did not like yours — you 
 seemed to have anticipated so. By (but ?) tell me if you approve of this 
 of mine, though I fear it will be accomplished before you write. It will 
 be rather an expensive concern, though the friends here of mine, mostly 
 Artists, who are delighted with Keats's works, offered to subscribe, but 
 this I won't allow. I shall make it out somehow. Yet I will have it 
 handsome,- even for my own credit as an artist, as well as my other 
 feelings. I understand that the Life is advertised. I wrote to Mr. 
 Taylor, but have never received any answer — tell me if you know as to 
 this. I would like to know if I have given offence to Mr. Taylor — tell 
 
 me if you correspond with him I am now occupied on a picture 
 
 for the Somerset House Exhibition .... I shall also send Keats's 
 portrait 
 
 " I have not heard of Shelley's ashes— how shall I do ? Tell me on 
 this point, and you shall find me apt .... I have not shaken hands 
 with one mutual friend of mine and Keats's since I left England. You 
 can't think of this, my dear Brown, at least riot feel it " 
 
 What memories must have been stirred in Severn's mind 
 when, in the • Adonais' Preface, he came to the now famous 
 words, " It might make one in love with death to think that 
 one should be buried in so sweet a place." 
 
 " The following words," he says in one of his letters home, " I have 
 read again and again, till I can read no more for the tears that rise and 
 obscure my sight : ' The circumstances of the closing scene of poor Keats's 
 life were not made known to me until the Elegy was ready for the press. 
 I am given to understand that the wound which his sensive spirit had 
 received from the criticism of "Endymion," was exasperated by the 
 bitter sense of unrequited benefits ; the poor fellow seems to have been 
 hastened from the stage of life, no less by those on whom he had wasted 
 the promise of his genius, than those on' whom he had lavished his 
 fortune and. his care. He was accompanied to Rome, and attended in 
 his last illness by Mr. Severn, a young artist of the highest promise, who, 
 I have been informed, " almost risked his own life, and sacrificed every 
 prospect to unwearied attendance upon his dying friend." Had I known 
 these circumstances before the completion of my, poem, I should have 
 been tempted to add my feeble tribute of applause to the more solid 
 recompense which the virtuous man finds in the recollection of his own 
 
THE 'ADONAIS' PREFACE. 121 
 
 motives. Mr. Severn can dispense with a reward from " such stuff as 
 dreams are made of." His conduct is a golden augury of the success of 
 his future career — may the unextinguished Spirit of his illustrious friend 
 animate the creations of his pencil, and plead against oblivion for his 
 name! 1 " 
 
 In a later letter Severn says that, " as a source of inspiration 
 for high effort," he chalked upon a blank space on the wall, 
 where his eyes would often see them, the memorable closing 
 words : " May the unextinguished spirit of his illustrious 
 friend animate the creations of his pencil and plead against 
 oblivion for his name ! " His gratification, however, was 
 somewhat damped by the reception of ' Adonais ' in England, 
 and though in late life he recognised at its true value 
 Shelley's generous tribute, he was often, throughout the 
 months succeeding the publication of • Adonais,' unpleasantly 
 reminded of his " association with the detestable school of 
 republicans, atheists, and free-livers." 
 
 "When it was published in. 1821," he writes in his reminiscences, "it 
 occasioned a great stir in London among my friends and my family, for 
 in the preface his mention of me — though written with such fine taste 
 and feeling — was by them taken in a quite contrary spirit, and I was 
 written to immediately with warnings and prayers that I would break 
 off all acquaintance with a man of such vile reputation as Shelley, or it 
 would be ruinous to my standing and prospects. How singular are the 
 changing manners of the changing world ! Ten years later I was sought 
 at Borne by members of the young aristocracy, as the friend of Keats 
 and Shelley — and this arose from the very preface which had the contrary 
 effect on its publication. To that preface, indeed, I owe some of my 
 proudest and most valuable associations and friends, including William 
 Ewart Gladstone, who all consider Shelley the only real religious poet 
 of the age. However, it was not long that I had to be ' in danger ' of 
 Shelley, for in less than a year after Keats's death he was drowned, and 
 I had the melancholy task of placing his ashes (his body was burned) by 
 the side of Keats, where an infant of Shelley's had been already buried." * 
 
 After quotation of the closing stanza of 'Adonais,' 
 
 ending — 
 
 " I am borne darkly, fearfully, afar ; 
 > Whilst burning through the inmost veil of Heaven, 
 
 The soul of Adonais, like a star, 
 Beacons from the abode where the Eternal are ! " 
 
 Originally, Shelley's son William was buried beside Keats. 
 
122 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Severn writes : — 
 
 "'Tis thought that the poet is also a prophet, and certainly in the- 
 case of Shelley the saying is Strikingly borne out — for in this stanza 
 he foretells his own speedy death, which occurred six months after 
 he wrote these prophetic lines. He was drowned in the Gulf of 
 Spezzia by the upsetting of his boat, and his body was identified by the 
 volume of Keats' poems in his pocket. By the quarantine laws it 
 was not permitted to remove the body from the sea-coast, and therefore 
 the poet's friend, Mr. Trelawny, adopted the alternative of cremation. 
 The bones and ashes were conveyed to Eome to be placed by the side 
 of his infant son William, and there under the old wall of Eome is his- 
 tombstone, shaded by a group of cypresses, planted at the time by Edward 
 Trelawny. The inscription ' Cor Cordium ' was the suggestion of Leigh 
 Hunt, and the plain stone adjoining that of Shelley was placed there by 
 Trelawny, who purchased the ground that he might finally be laid beside- 
 the poet. In order to mark the occasion and the locality with an apt 
 epitaph, Trelawny wrote to many of his literary friends. Several consented 
 and composed inscriptions for the tomb, but the mourner was not satisfied 
 with any of them', and after his waiting and tribulating a whole month,, 
 a friend who was present at the interment proposed to supply the deficiency 
 as follows : — 
 
 " ' Here lies Edward Trelawny, for he is still living.' " 
 
 It is noteworthy, by the way, that Severn more than once,, 
 in enumerating the few friends who were present at the 
 interment of Shelley's ashes in Rome, omits mention of 
 Leigh Hunt, who is frequently stated to have been present.. 
 The following letters afford conclusive proof that Leigh- 
 Hunt was absent at the ceremony, and are, at 4he same 
 time, full of a painful interest. The first is addressed to 
 Hunt, the second to Charles Brown. 
 
 " Jan. 21, 1823. 
 " My dear Hunt, 
 
 " I have just returned from poor Sheiley's funeral, the accumulating, 
 delays which have taken place having prevented me writing [earlier]. 
 I had hoped from day to day to give you the finish of this melancholy 
 task; but these droning Italians threw everything in the way. The 
 delay has been unfortunate — it has given me great pain and much fruitless, 
 endeavouring. You must know that the Government here has made a 
 new Burial Ground for us heretics— well walled in to protect us from the 
 Catholics who destroyed the Protestant Tombs, and shewed us every 
 indignity — this was some years back. The old ground, which contains- 
 our dear Keats and the son of Mr. Shelley, stands against the Pyramid 
 of Caius Cestius — the English have often petitioned to have it walled in • 
 
BURIAL OF SHELLEY'S ASHES. 123 
 
 but no, the Government thought it would spoil the view — and perhaps 
 it is so — it is the most lovely spot I know. They have now made this 
 new grouud only twenty feet from it, and it is well protected by walk 
 and soldiers. Now here was the difficulty : they had ordered that no 
 more should be deposited in the old place, and we could not get permission 
 to inter the ashes in the same spot, so we were driven to the alternative 
 of removing them both to the new ground. Here another difficulty faced 
 us. The grave was opened immediately under the stone, and we found 
 the skeleton of a grown person ! The stone had been placed in a wrong 
 place, so that we had horribly disturbed a stranger's grave. I could search 
 no further — we were surrounded by respectful, but wondering Italians,, 
 and so we proceeded to the interment of Mr. Shelley's ashes alone. This was 
 distressing after what you had said ; but I know that you feel and think 
 with me, that it could not be otherwise. . . ." 
 
 " Some, 
 "Jan. 21, 1823. 
 " My dear Brown, 
 
 " I have just returned from the Funeral of poor Shelley. Much delay 
 had taken place from the difficulty of placing the remains together. You. 
 must know a new Burial Ground has been made, well walled in, to 
 protect us heretics against the Catholics, who had most wantonly defaced 
 many of the Protestant Tombs. The old Ground they would not wall,, 
 because it would spoil the view of the Pyramid of Caius Cestius, so this 
 new one is given, and the old one protected with a Ditch, and with an 
 order that no more shall be buried there. Now here was the difficulty. 
 Shelley's ashes were not permitted to [be] placed in the Old Ground 
 where his Child lay, so that we were driven to the alternative of 
 the new place, and of disinterring the Bones of the Child and placing 
 them together ; but even this was frustrated, after I had got permission 
 to do it, for, on opening the grave, we discovered a skeleton of 5£ feet. 
 Tet it appeared to be under the Stone, so that some mistake must have- 
 been made in placing the Stone. To search further we dare not, for it 
 was in the presence of many respectful but wondering Italians : nay, I 
 thought it would have been a doubtful aud horrible thing to disturb any 
 more Strangers' Graves in a Foreign Land. So we proceeded very respect- 
 fully to deposit poor Shelley's ashes alone. There were present General 
 Cockburn, Sir C. Sykes, Messrs. Kirkup, Westmacott, Scoles, Freeborn,, 
 and the Bevs. W. Cook and Burgess. These two gentlemen, with myself, 
 wished it to be done solemnly and decently, so the Box was inclosed in 
 a coffin, and it was done altogether as by the hands of Friends. My next, 
 sad office is to place poor Keats's Grave Stone, which is not yet done. I 
 hope this week it will be finished. I shall put some Evergreens round 
 it — of course it is in the Old Ground. I was going to make a proposition 
 to you. There is now here, living with me, a young English Sculptor 
 named Gott, of most rare and delicate genius, who from his first coming 
 to Borne (seven months) has been ill with the Fever. He had a Gold 
 Medal with me in the B.A., and is now sent here (pensioned like myself)* 
 
124 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 by Sir T. Lawrence. Oh Ms account I am going to ask your advice 
 about a little Monument to Keats, more worthy him than ours, to be 
 placed (if it is thought better) in Hampstead Church. What gave me 
 this Idea was the applications of several gentlemen to subscribe twenty 
 guineas, &c, for this purpose. I have no doubt it might be done. The 
 Subject of a Basso-rilievo was this which I thought. ' Our Keats sitting, 
 habited in a simple Greek Costume — he has half strung his Lyre, when 
 the Fates seize him. One arrests his arm, another cuts the thread, and 
 the third pronounces his Fate.' Gott is very pleased with this Idea and 
 thinks he could make a fine thing of it. Another thing — I know his 
 works would have pleased so much Keats's taste. It will give him spirits, 
 also, since he finds his income too small to support his Wife and 2 Children. 
 Tell me how you take this — think of it charitably. If any further than 
 the plain stone is placed over Shelley (sic), pray let him do it. . . ." 
 
a vision of ' endymion: 125 
 
 CHAPTEE VI. 
 
 A vision of ' Endymion ' — Letter from Edward Holmes — Charles Brown 
 comes to Italy — Correspondence — Leigh Hunt: Byron: Keats — Letter 
 from Sir Thomas Lawrence, P.E.A. — The 'Greek Shepherds' and 
 other Art-work — The Keats-monument project — First impressions of 
 Trelawny — Letter from Leigh Hunt— Severn goes to Venice — His 
 growing repute as an artist — Severn as a musician. 
 
 Severn, notwithstanding the warnings he had received 
 about the unhealthiness of the city during the great heats, 
 contentedly spent the summer in Rome. He had been 
 invited to Florence, but, as he says in one of his home- 
 letters, " I preferred to remain and study from the divine 
 pictures of Raphael." Already he had fallen into the bad 
 habit — from which, in the following year and for some 
 time afterward, he preserved himself — of trusting to memory 
 or observation of other pictures for his presentation of 
 nature. Drawing, composition, and artistic verisimilitude, 
 the qualities wherein he had most need to improve, were 
 too often indifferently studied by him. 
 
 " The Eoman summer — my first — found me," he says in his ' Eemi- 
 niscences,' " in its solitude waiting in hopes of my pension, and the result 
 of many other things then existing only in experiment. My health 
 kept improving, and so I had no fear of malaria. I liked the loneliness as 
 I had so much to commune with myself as regards the future. Among 
 many visits I made to Keats's grave at Monte Testaccio was one of a 
 very striking nature. In the twilight of the full moon I found a young 
 Italian asleep, his head resting against the gravestone, his dog and his flock 
 of sheep about him, with the full moon rising beyond the Pyramid of 
 Caius Cestius. One long moonbeam stole past the Pyramid and illumined 
 the outline of the young shepherd's face, and to my eye realised the 
 story of Endymion. What would Keats — who, as I have already said, 
 made me go once and again during his lingering illness to see the place 
 where he was to be buried, and who was so pleased with what I told 
 him of it that at times it seemed almost his only consolation — what would 
 Keats have said had he seen this Endymion vision ? " 
 
126 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Nearly forty years after this episode, Severn painted it for 
 Keats's biographer, Lord Houghton, then Monckton Milnes. 
 In the early autumn Severn set himself to the painting of 
 two pictures of classical subjects. Although, as he says, 
 *"'my passion was for Italian pastoral nature, yet I felt 
 bound to study academically, and so began my ' Alexander 
 the Great reading Homer,' and of 'Greek Hill-Shepherds 
 rescuing a Lamb from an Eagle,' founded upon a passage in 
 Keats's ' Hymn to Pan.' " Neither of these, he admits, was 
 in any way successful, but, no doubt, they were eminently 
 rserviceable in teaching him to seek at the fountain-head 
 what he was vainly striving to gain from alien tributaries. 
 
 On the return of the English residents in September 
 Severn's solitude was soon broken in upon. His acquaint- 
 ances grew in number steadily, and some of them were 
 people of high rank and influence, among them the Duchess 
 of Devonshire, who was exceptionally kind, but died not 
 very long after her acquaintanceship with Severn had begun. 
 Chief among these new friends, in after-influence upon his 
 life, was the Countess of Westmorland. 
 
 The winter was for him one of hard work, with intervals 
 of novel and delightful social enjoyment. The new year 
 opened favourably, for the Academy pension ensured a 
 sufficient income for at least a period of three years. 
 
 Early in the year Severn was gratified to receive a letter 
 from Edward Holmes, one of his oldest and most intimate 
 acquaintances, valued for his own sake, and also because he 
 had been the schoolfellow and dear friend of Keats. They 
 had, moreover, one strong bond in common — music. Keats 
 owed much pleasure to both, and particularly, in the early 
 London days, to Holmes. It is pleasant to find the latter 
 writing so sensibly about Shelley.* 
 
 * Edward Holmes (1797-1859). Holmes's chief writings are a ' Life 
 of Mozart ' and a ' Memoir of Purcell.' He wrote some excellent papers 
 on the English Glee and Madrigal Composers, and was himself a composer 
 of songs, of which ' My Jenny ' was popular. It was he who went with 
 Vincent Novello to Germany, in 1828, to present to Mozart's widow the 
 subscription they had raised in England. Of this trip Holmes wrote an 
 account, 'A Ramble with some of the Musicians of Germany,' which 
 passed into three editions. 
 
LETTER FROM EDWARD HOLMES. 127 
 
 "London, 
 
 " February 23rd, 1822. 
 " Dear Severn, 
 
 " .... I was delighted at hearing that you had obtained the allow- 
 ance from the Academy, which will enable you to work away at your 
 painting with such a gusto. All your future fame seems to me to depend 
 on your application now, and with such advantages and inducements 
 -as you have to work, I am sure great performances may be expected from 
 .you. I was half afraid those old devils at the Academy meant to humbug 
 you out of the money ; but it has happened very fortunately, and I give 
 you joy. I think if you were suddenly transported to England you would 
 scarcely know the place again, it is so strangely altered ; not only are all 
 the buildings and streets different from what they were, but none of our 
 old acquaintances and friends live where they did ; they seem all to have 
 been suddenly whisked away by the four winds, the Lord knows where, 
 tand they seem to have lost many of their inclinations and feelings in the 
 hurry of the change. This is what has made me wish for you back many 
 hundred times, and I assure you, without sending a compliment all this 
 way, that if I had known the sacrifice I was making of your society 
 and neighbourhood, at the time you left, half as well as I do now, it 
 would have cost me a devilish deal more to have given you up than it did. 
 Mr. Hunt has left London on his way to Italy, and hopes to join Lord 
 Byron and Shelley at Pisa by the spring or soon after ; I advise you, 
 if possible, to join him there, as he told me that he would introduce you 
 to Lord Byron and Shelley, and you know of what consequence the 
 society of men like these is to a person of your pursuits ; besides, you are 
 jpersonally indebted to Shelley for the very handsome manner in which he 
 has mentioned your name in his elegy on Keats. It is as honourable 
 a testimonial to your friendship as could be made publicly ; just such a 
 thing as you deserved, and I was delighted beyond measure when Mr. 
 Hunt read it to me. I know you have some old prejudices against Shelley, 
 but you may depend upon it that he is a much abused person, and the 
 world has from time immemorial chosen the most amiable people and 
 its greatest benefactors for the subjects of its spite and malignity — witness 
 your own. favourite Christ. If you should go to. Pisa you will most 
 probably meet Mr. Brown, who leaves this place in March, and I wish I 
 •could make the same promise for myself, but I must be content to 
 remain a Barbarian of the North. Having now given you a faithful 
 account of all the people who leave for Italy, I must tell you something 
 about those who remain at home. The message that you sent by me to 
 Eichards I have not delivered, as we never meet now, and he is one of 
 those men whom I should have thought could never have fallen in my 
 ■esteem, but some of those strangest unaccountable things have happened, 
 which sometimes do fall out, and we are no longer friends — you shall have 
 my reason at another opportunity. . . . ." 
 
 From a long letter written in March to his father, there 
 
128 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 is a detailed account of Severn's doings and surroundings, 
 and of his progress with his picture of ' Alexander the Great.' 
 On the same day — with the same letter, in fact — he wrote as 
 follows to his brother Tom, giving a vivid account of an 
 amusing episode. The idea of going to Venice with East- 
 lake was not fulfilled; but it is interesting to note that 
 Severn and Eastlake had become so friendly. 
 
 "It is my intention after I have finished my 'Alexander,' 
 or on the approach of the dangerous season here, to go to 
 Venice. I am going with Mr. Eastlake, a painter of great 
 talent. We intend to work very hard in copying from the 
 many fine pictures there. I make small copies in oil. This 
 Venice is the most choice place in the world for pictures. 
 I expect to derive great improvement from the visit. The 
 spring has set in here at last, and most divinely ; for six 
 weeks the sky has scarce had a cloud ; one fine day beats 
 another, until it will be Paradise. 
 
 " We had a droll affair here the other night. Soon after 
 our Academy had met, my old servant tapped at the door 
 and said there were thieves in the house. In an instant our 
 model (who is a very strong and honest man) leaped down 
 from the throne, seized a large stick, and, stark naked, went 
 in pursuit of them half-way down the street. It turned out 
 to be a mistake ; but the family who live under me were 
 much alarmed, and a lady, a countess, who is a beautiful 
 musician, stood at the door wringing her hands in great 
 fright and crying, when at the moment returns the model 
 from the street, stark naked, and suddenly the lady and her 
 sisters forgot their fears and set up a laugh that I thought 
 would have killed them — but I assure you the model had a 
 droll effect." 
 
 Instead of going to Venice Severn left Eome in the 
 middle of May for Naples, having been advised to do so after 
 a sudden and severe illness that had prostrated him. It was 
 a pleasant journey, he writes, though haunted by pathetic 
 memories of the circumstances in which he had previously 
 made it. There was no dying poet now for him to tend and 
 delight with wild flowers, and cheer with sanguine hopes and 
 
GEA8. DROWN COMES TO ITALY. 129 
 
 bright conversation ; in turn, he was the invalid, and Keats 
 was asleep below the violets under the old Eoman wall. 
 
 " I got through the pleasantly tedious journey without similar attacks, 
 though I had to be very careful. I was more than once in peril. Thus, 
 soon after our start, we were stopped in the Pontine marshes by the 
 breaking of a wheel, and had to stay about seven nocturnal hours in the 
 most deadly malaria. The air was heavy with a damp fog exuding from 
 rank vegetation and a poisonous soil, with a heavy vapour from the 
 neighbouring canal. In the latter, the largest toads I ever saw were 
 crawling up and down the banks in great numbers, most loathsome looking 
 creatures, at least thirteen inches in length. We had to keep ourselves 
 awake by drinking tea, for sleep would have been fatal soon or late." 
 
 He returned in October, well in health, and having 
 accomplished a great quantity of work in pictures, studies 
 and sketches. In the early autumn he received from Charles 
 Brown the welcome news of the latter's arrival in Ttaly. 
 
 "Pisa, 
 " 5th Sept., 1822. 
 " My dear Severn, 
 
 "Here I am at last. I arrived here six days ago with my little 
 boy. In London I could not learn in what part of Italy you intended to 
 pass the summer, and one of my first questions with Leigh Hunt was 
 touching your present abode. He believes you to be at Naples, so at 
 Naples I address this letter. Yet I will not venture till I hear from you to 
 send three letters from Holmes, Ewing, and Eichards, which were entrusted 
 to my care. From Turin to Genoa I had a tedious process to go through, 
 and in the felucca, which was to carry us to Leghorn, we were favoured 
 with a storm and contrary winds, and everything that was abominable, till 
 my patience at the end of four days was exhausted, and landing at Lerici, 
 I came here by carriage, with an English gentleman. You have heard, I 
 suppose, of Shelley being drowned near Lerici. I am really grieved for 
 him. I believe he was a good man, and, certainly he was a good friend to 
 Keats, and to his memory. His body has been burnt, and I understand 
 his ashes are to be deposited near his child at Eome. A Captain Williams 
 was also drowned with him. Lord Byron is moving off to Genoa, and so 
 is Hunt with his family. Hunt introduced me to his Lordship two or 
 three days ago, which is considered (not by me) as a prodigious favour. I 
 was prejudiced against him, but somehow he got the better of my prejudice, 
 and I hear he has taken a liking to me. I should like to keep house with 
 you at Florence for a twelvemonth ; my brat, in the hands of a servant, 
 will not annoy either of us. Now I wait for an answer, and then I shall 
 send your letters. Good-bye, my dear Severn, and believe me ever 
 
 " Yours sincerely, 
 
 " Charles Brown." 
 K 
 
]30 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Severn wrote at once in reply, and though regretting his 
 inability to go to Pisa, promised to meet his friend the 
 following year in Florence, if not in Eome. In December 
 he heard again from Leigh Hunt. 
 
 (" Direct to me, 
 
 " ' Ferma in Posta,' Genoa.) 
 
 " 16th Dec, 1822. 
 " Dear Sbvekn, 
 
 " You and I have gone through hard tosses and trials since we saw 
 each other last, too terrihle at present to dwell upon ; but these things 
 at all events bind the survivors the closer, and if I had not had a regard 
 and respect for you on your own account I should have had them both 
 after what you did for Keats, and what my late beloved.friend said and 
 thought of you. Pray tell me if I can in any way help to further any of 
 your views. Brown tells me that you say you shall regard me here as 
 standing in the same light to you as Shelley did. You do not know how 
 that compliment goes to my heart. Write to me, pray, and tell me about 
 your pictures, your prospects, and all that you can afford time to write 
 about. You are naturally, I believe, no greater lover of letter-writing than 
 myself; but you must know I am mending in this respect, and I will give 
 you a reason for writing to me speedily, which I am sure you will think a 
 good one. I am very uneasy about a circumstance, which I wish you to 
 inquire. into forme. You know, I believe, the way in which my friend's 
 remains were finally consigned to their coffin after being rescued from the 
 sea. They were burnt, collected into it or rather into a small funeral-box, 
 and sent to Eome for interment near his little boy in the same ground as 
 dear Keats. Now some difficulties, it seems, have started with respect, to 
 their consignment to the ground. The gentleman to whose care they were 
 sent is a Mr. Freeborn, a merchant, correspondent of a Mr. Grant at 
 Leghorn, to whom they were first consigned. The friend, who is the 
 medium between these gentlemen and Mrs. Shelley (who is at present 
 living here with us), is not a man of business, though a very good fellow ■ 
 and altogether the delay, which has now been long, is a very distressing 
 one, and without further explanation not very intelligible. There is a 
 talk of some difficulty on the part of the Government ; but everything has 
 been conducted regularly through the other Government, the Sardinian, in 
 whose territory the remains were found, and if any interference is wanted 
 on the part of the English ambassador no doubt it could be obtained. 
 Now will you be kind enough to go to Mr. Freeborn's, as the friend of 
 Mr. Shelley's nearest friends, and let us know exactly how the matter 
 stands ? "When we know this we may know what to do finally. You 
 have nothing, dear Severn, but funeral tasks put upon you ; but they are 
 for extraordinary people and excellent friends, and I hope .all our prospects 
 will brighten again fcefore we join them. Yours, I trust, have been doing 
 so, as well as mine; but Italy, the most cheerful of all places to me when 
 
LEIQH HUNT: BYRON: KEATS. 131 
 
 I first came, is uo longer the Italy it was, and never again can be. Its 
 brightest sunshine will always have a shade in the very core of it. Again, 
 what are you painting? what doing? what expecting? Your sketch of 
 Keats is always over my shelf, and Mrs. Hunt, notwithstanding her long 
 and terrible illness, which is however better upon the whole, never omits 
 to be proud of showing the sketch you made of me to every stranger. 
 
 " Yours sincerely, 
 
 " Leigh Hunt. 
 " P.S. — Lord Byron says he shall be happy to do anything that lies in 
 his power to serve you. I wish, you had rescued him out of the hands of 
 an Italian sculptor and Raphael Morghen, who have conspired to make a 
 vile unMJceness of him." 
 
 Earlier in the same month Severn wrote to Brown : 
 
 ". . . . I had just given my directions about poor Keats's grave- 
 stone. Your mention of your still-existing wish for the epitaph as it 
 stood made me all consent. I saw the superiority of it — it is doing so {sic). 
 I am all anxiety to know about poor Miss Brawne. Pray tell me this, if 
 you have more accounts. I shall be most ravenous by May to have a 
 si;:ht of you. What must regulate the time is the finishing my 
 'Alexander,' after the 'Greek Shepherds' now going on. This, with 
 ' Falstaff,' and I hope Keats's portrait, will be in the Exhibition next 
 
 summer in London Did you ever have poor Keats's papers ? 
 
 Know you about the Life ? Taylor is going to publish, after all. He has 
 never written to me [again] — is this kind ? . . . . Poor Shelley's ashes 
 have arrived. When I get out, I will conduct them to the grave, with 
 the respect due to the Friend of Keats. I have not yet heard from Hunt 
 or Lord Murray 
 
 " Have you got a spare copy of the ' Lamia ' or the ' Endymion ' ? 1 
 have been cheated out of mine, and I am so vexed to be without. My 
 friend Mr. Gott (the sculptor who had a gold medal with me) is doing 
 something from ' Endymion,' and I have a drawing going on from ' St. 
 Agnes' Eve.' Pray think of us." 
 
 Shortly after his arrival in Borne from Naples Severn had 
 heard again from Charles Brown, in reply to a letter of his 
 own concerning the inscription for Keats's tomb. From this 
 and other letters of Brown's of this period, it is clear that 
 he was steadily engaged in literary work : and, no doubt, 
 from his standpoint, he had reason to be proud of his 
 measure of success. 
 
 "Nov. 7th, 1822. 
 " I got your letter yesterday. If not too late pray reflect a little more 
 on the inscription for our Keats. Remember it was his dying request 
 
 K 2 
 
132 LIFE OF JOSEPS SEVERN. 
 
 that his name should not be on his tombstone, and that the words ' Here 
 lies one whose name was writ in water ' should be there. I thought you 
 liked my inscription, for you said so. All his friends, Hunt, Richards, 
 Dilke, and every one I showed it to, were greatly pleased with it. You 
 seem to imagine it does not honour him enough, but, to our miuds, it says 
 more in his praise than if his name were mentioned. You have done 
 right in not accepting of any assistance from strangers to his worth, in 
 erecting this gravestone ; but I insist on bearing my share, and I will 
 pay it you when we meet in Florence — you shall not have all the 
 pleasure — a mournful one — but still a pleasure., I told you all I could, 
 all that Hunt could tell me, about Shelley's ashes — Mrs. Shelley had then 
 set off to Genoa. As for Mr. Taylor, I have no correspondence with him 
 whatever. When we meet, if it live in my remembrance so long, and it 
 is hardly worth it, I will tell you the whole story. Even my friends allow, 
 and that I have found a rare thing, that he has behaved badly towards 
 
 me, and, to my mind, unfeelingly towards the memory of Keats 
 
 " I cannot give you any account of Lord Byron's and Leigh Hunt's 
 work, except that it is called ' The Liberal,' and that the first number 
 came out on the 14th of October. To write in such good company I feel 
 a great honour. What I shall be paid I know not ; but it can't be less 
 than what the ' New Monthly ' paid me, twelve guineas per sheet. I 
 hear they are much pleased with my article ' Les Charmettes and 
 Rousseau ' ; and they have another which Hunt saw in Pisa, and said 
 was very good indeed." 
 
 Severn certainly at one time entertained the idea of living 
 with Brown in Florence, but only while the prospect was a 
 distant one. With the spring of 1823 he had come to the 
 conclusion that even the pleasure of his friend's companion- 
 ship, and the economy involved in a joint expenditure, 
 would not make up for the advantages he enjoyed in 
 Borne. 
 
 About the beginning of 1823, he received the following 
 letter from Sir Thomas Lawrence, President of the Eoyal 
 Academy, in response to a communication wherein he had 
 recounted his artistic doings and set forth his progress, and 
 had at the same time hoped that the Council might see its 
 way to assisting him in his effort to establish and extend an 
 English Academy in Rome. 
 
 " Russell Square, 
 
 "Dec. 23rd, 1822. 
 " Sir, 
 
 " I am sorry that the pressure of much business, and the propriety of 
 
 laying the subject of your letter before a general meeting of the Royal 
 
LETTER FROM SIR TEOS, LAWRENCE, P.R.A. 133 
 
 Academy, prevents me at present from sonding a satisfactory answer to 
 your gratifying communication. I must not pretend to conjecture the 
 degree or mode of assistance that can ha offered to you by this Institution, 
 and I must previously request of you to hear in mind that, from the 
 •common distress of the times, there are many afflicting claims on its 
 finances, that exceedingly limit its general power of service, and I fear, 
 with the necessary expenses of the establishment, may deny it the 
 pleasure of affording you such enlarged assistance as otherwise would be 
 the prompt determination of each individual member. 
 
 " The difficulty of presuming to legislate for you at this distance, and 
 in ignorance of many local circumstances which must materially influence 
 the arrangement of any defined plan, at once deters me from the attempt. 
 I trust you, however, to convey to your friends my strong sense of their 
 nattering attention to me, and of their too poetical deference to my 
 opinion. 
 
 " If I may venture to suggest anything, it is that of a policy of great 
 prudence and moderation, in the first outset of the undertaking — that you 
 limit your views as strictly as possible to the absolute necessities of study,' 
 and suffer the comforts of full convenient accommodation to be the 
 gradual result of your success. My sincere wishes prompt me to offer 
 the unauthorised hope, that but little may be left for other subscription, 
 but such as may neither be wounding to rational pride, nor affect your 
 independence ; and that in some way or other, though on more limited 
 scale, the English Academy at Home may yet vie in real usefulness and 
 dignity with the other foreign institutions of that beloved city. 
 
 "I cannot sufficiently admire the patriotism and liberality of Mr. 
 Hamilton's conduct. His letter speaks him as fine a gentleman as he is 
 a generous benefactor, and his name, I have no doubt, will always he 
 remembered in the Academy with the warmest affection and respect. If 
 the convivial ever presumes to break in on the sacred severities of study, 
 it must be justified by the grateful satisfaction of establishing that name 
 as the first standing toast. 
 
 " You may rely on my communicating to you the result of the opinions 
 of the next general meeting of the Royal Academy, and their decision on 
 your letter. I take the liberty of offering for the present funds of your 
 Academy the sum of £50, yet entreating the society not to consider it as 
 contribution from the President of our own institution, although I take 
 advantage of that character, for the freedom of presenting it. I will give 
 directions for its being placed in the hands of Messrs. Torlonia, payable 
 to the order of my greatly esteemed friend Mr. Eastlake, to whom I beg 
 the kindness of you to present my best regards. 
 
 " Believe me to be, Sir, 
 " Your obliged and obedient servant, 
 
 " Thomas Lawrence." 
 
 Unfortunately, it cannot be said that then or later the 
 English Academy in Rome ever got within reach of " vying 
 
134 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 in real usefulness and dignity with the other similar foreign 
 institutions." 
 
 The spring of 1823 quickly passed. Severn was so busy 
 with his Art-work that he saw few friends ; refrained from 
 his then spasmodic diary-keeping, and let his not very large, 
 correspondence drop into long arrears. He finished hi& 
 ' Greek Shepherds ' and his ' Death of Alexander,' and sent 
 them to England, and though much engaged upon hia other 
 canvases, found time to paint several miniature portraits. 
 
 Early in the year, as we know (p. 123, ante), he wrote 
 to Brown, upon the subject of the erection of a monument 
 in England, in London or Hampstead preferably, to the-, 
 memory of Keats. Having suggested that Mr. Gott, the 
 young sculptor who shared his abode, should be entrusted 
 with the commission, and spoken warmly of his powers;. 
 and referred to the establishment of the so-called English 
 Academy in Rome, in which he had taken an active 
 part, and to the several artistic projects he had in 
 view, as well as the pictures upon which he was actually 
 engaged ; he ended with an account of the burial of. 
 Shelley's ashes, and of the disturbing of other remains in 
 the making of the grave. There can be little question as 
 to the good sense and wise discretion of Brown's answer to 
 Severn's plea for the erection of a monument to Keats in 
 London or Hampstead. No one loved and revered the 
 memory of the young poet more than Brown did, but his - - 
 was no feather-brain affection that could be blind to all 
 save the fulfilment of its own immediate desires ; moreover,, 
 he knew, as Severn had no means of knowing, the virulence 
 and spite of the small fry in " the wretched literary world ; '" 
 and, indeed, at that time the jealous ill-will even of men 
 who might be supposed superior to pettiness of mind and 
 meanness of judgment. 
 
 " February 7th, 1823. 
 "My dear Severn, 
 
 "There is one subject in your letter that has employed my con- 
 sideration, and that to the best of my ability — I mean the erecting of a 
 monument to Keats's memory in England. In one word, I cannot but 
 
FIBS2 IMPRESSIONS OF TRELAWNY. 135 
 
 disapprove of it. The fact is this : his fame is not sufficiently general ; 
 with the few and the best judges it stands high, but his name is unknown 
 to the multitude. Therefore I think that prior to his name being some- 
 what more celebrated, a monument to his memory might even retard 
 it, and it might provoke ill-nature, and (shall I say it ?) ridicule. When 
 I quitted England his works were still unsaleable. For that cruel word 
 ridicule I must explain myself. There apppeared, some time after his 
 death, in one of the Government newspapers, an article scoffing at him and 
 joking at his death. I did not read it, I could not, but I heard of it, and 
 it put me in a fortnight's irritation. In prudence we ought to wait awhile. 
 First, let his merit be undoubted. Let it not be said that not only bad 
 men have costly tombs with flattering inscriptions, but that nowadays bad 
 poets have the like. This will be as unpleasant as irksome, as discordant 
 for you to read as it is for me to write ; but I must tell you the truth, 
 his name is yet scarce anything in England ; it becomes, and will become, 
 more ennobled every day, while a monument might throw that happy time 
 back. Ten years hence, to my mind, will be time enough. You, in your 
 affection for him, think nothing can be done too much. Alas ! I, knowing 
 the wretched literary world, think otherwise. Yet still all this "is but 
 one man's opinion, and one as likely to err as yourself, and from the same 
 motive, though our opinions are contrary. I regret that I am against the 
 interest (in this instance) of your friend the sculptor, whose name I cannot 
 make out in your letter ; but if you mention my reasons to that gentleman, 
 he will surely understand me. I could say much more on this head, but 
 why ? — you with this already written can fill up the rest. I thank you 
 for the particular account you give of the ceremony of depositing Shelley's 
 ashes ; that disturbing of other bones — though I am by no means scru- 
 pulous about such matters — made me start, for it might happen that some 
 living friend of the skeleton should hear of it." 
 
 In April Severn wrote again to Brown : 
 
 "There is a mad chap come here, whose name is Trelawny. I do pot 
 know what to make of him, further than his queer, and, I was near 
 saying, shabby, behaviour to me. He comes as the friend of Shelley, 
 great, glowing, and rich in romance. Of course I showe4 all my paint-po,t 
 politeness to him, to the very brim — assisted him to remove the asb.es of 
 Shelley to a spot where he himself (when this world has done with his 
 body) will lie. He wished me to think, myself, and consult my friends, 
 about a monument 'to Shelley. The situation is beautiful, and one and 
 all thought a little basso-relievo would be the best taste. I was telling 
 him the subject I had proposed for Keats, and he was struck with' the 
 propriety of it for Shelley, and my friend Mr. Gott (whom I mentioned to 
 you) was to be the doer of it. I made the drawing, which cost us some 
 trouble, yet after expressing the greatest liking for it, the pair of Mustaj- 
 chios has shirked off from it, without giving us the yes or no — without 
 even the why or wherefore. I am sorry at this most on Mr. Gott's 
 account, but I ought to have seen that this Lord Byron's jaokal was rather 
 
136 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 weak in all the points that I could judge, though strong enough in 
 stilettos. We have not had any open rupture, nor shall we, for I have no 
 doubt that this 'cockney corsair ' fancies he has greatly obliged us by all 
 this trouble we have had. But tell me who is this odd fish ? They talk 
 of him here as a camelion (sic), who went mad on reading Lord Byron's 
 ' Corsair.' He told me that he knew you." 
 
 About the middle of May, Severn heard from Leigh Hunt, 
 in reply to a request which he had made as to the use, for 
 the Keats Memoirs, of the letter which Leigh Hunt had 
 written before he knew of the poet's death. The "royal 
 news " alluded to in the postscript probably concerns the 
 promise of Byron to be an active collaborator with Hunt in 
 his ill-starred journalistic venture. 
 
 " Genoa, 
 " May 10th, 1823. 
 
 ". . , . As to the letter concerning dear Keats, pray do with it as 
 you wish. It was very scrupulous in you to ask my permission, yet I 
 thank you for doing so, as it affords me another specimen of a nature that 
 I like, Gilby is a very good fellow, and so is Trelawny. Roberts I do not 
 know enough of to say what he is, but Trelawny likes him, and that is 
 something. Thank you for your attentions to them all. Trelawny will 
 be here in two or three weeks, and then, my dear Severn, I will write to 
 you further respecting those other interesting matters. I am sorry I 
 cannot join you at Florence in June, but at any rate we shall not be there 
 till autumn, if then. It will depend upon circumstances when we are to 
 move. My wife (who begs her best remembrances) is singularly well, for 
 her, and considering how dreadfully her health has been shaken; the 
 doctors say that she is about to have the best possible chance for the 
 recovery of her health. She expects to be confined in a month. Judge of 
 my anxiety. Good God! when shall we have an end of anxieties? I 
 iave been very uuwell myself since I wrote last, with a low fever, but it 
 is gone again, and I am returned as usual to my literary warfare upon 
 earth, pen in hand. God bless you, dear Severn. 
 
 " Yours very truly, 
 
 "Leigh Hunt." 
 
 As the spring advanced into summer, the likelihood of 
 Severn's visit to Florence seemed to lessen. He had hoped 
 for a remunerative commission, but as it had not reached 
 him, he feared to involve himself in money troubles by 
 leaving his work in Eome and going to a city where social 
 and other attractions would be numerous, and where his 
 expenses would be more than he could afford, even as the 
 
SEVERN GOES TO VENICE. 137 
 
 partial guest of Brown, at the latter's residence in an old 
 palace, part of which he had rented at an almost nominal sum. 
 But about the end of May he received a commission from 
 a Mr. Crauford to paint a replica of Eaphael's ' Madonna 
 della Sedia,' in the Pitti Gallery at Florence ; and though 
 at first he was uncertain as to the amount he was to be paid, 
 and thus whether the venture would be worth his while, he 
 wrote hopefully to his friend as to his probable imminent 
 arrival. Almost immediately afterwards he was able to 
 write again with the good news that all was satisfactory. 
 
 By the middle of June, Severn had temporarily settled in 
 Florence, well content to enjoy Brown's companionship 
 again; and, besides getting on with his replica of the 
 'Madonna della Sedia,' glad of the opportunity to make 
 studies for his ambitiously conceived picture of the ' Bescue 
 of Lorenzo di Medici from Assassination.' 
 
 Notwithstanding the summer heats, Severn remained in 
 Florence till the latter part of August, when he went, on 
 what proved a delightful and memorable visit, to Venice. 
 
 " To-morrow morning at four Brown and I set off to Venice, where next 
 to Heaven I long to go. He goes entirely on my account, good fellow — 
 how happy I am in his fellowship ! His learning, his candour, his expe- 
 rience, but most his good heart, are comforts to me that I have never 
 known since I left England. At Venice I shall make many studies in 
 oil-colours from the chief pictures. We return to Home in five weeks. 
 I have painted nineteen pictures (copies) here in Florence, and made sixty 
 drawings, for I have been blessed with real health during this summer, 
 which is all sun and heat. The great part of these pictures are prepa- 
 rations for my large picture, which I begin on the 1st of January. The 
 subject is ' Lorenzo di Medici rescued from Assassination by his Friends.' 
 This Lorenzo was the great Florence merchant about the time of our 
 Henry VIII. He revived the arts, literature, &c. ; everything is owing 
 to him. This picture represents an attempt on his life by some enemies 
 who were jealous of his greatness; he was saved by his friends, who 
 devoted their lives to him. Why I take this subject is — first, I am, and 
 everybody is, sick of sacred ones ; next, I am fond of Gothic architecture, 
 times, and people, and in the picture I shall show what is the feeling of 
 my own heart — a human being, who has raised himself to such a pitch 
 of goodness and greatness, that his friends devote their lives to save him. 
 The scene is in the Gothic cathedral of Florence; Lorenzo is encircled by 
 friends, his wife and son clinging round him ; his brother is just dying, 
 from the assassins' wounds, who rush forward to finish their deed ; but 
 
138 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 they are stopped, and Lorenzo's life is saved. Among the large group 
 of friends I introduce the portrait of Eaphael, the greatest painter that 
 ever lived ; Michael Angelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and many others of this 
 great time — as Lorenzo's friends, for they were ' protected ' by him. The 
 assassins chose the time when the High Priest raised the Host, and the 
 people were all prayiDg. This subject is well known and admired by the 
 English nobility. It is found best told in Koscoe's ' Life of Lorenzo di 
 Medici,' which is read and admired by everybody. It is a subject quite 
 new and very splendid in the dresses ; the background is from the actual 
 spot. My picture is 12 feet by 18, and I hope it will quite establish my 
 fame. I shall be all next year at work upon it." 
 
 There has already been occasion to allude to Severn's- 
 intimate love of music, one of the accomplishments of the- 
 young artist which had helped to endear him to Keats- 
 The following letter, which he wrote to his brother Tom 
 some eight or ten weeks after his Venetian holiday, is 
 interesting in this connection. His remarks upon Purcell, 
 and upon the artistic requirements of the art of song- 
 writing, are excellent. Severn's home-letters are generally 
 of a chatty nature, and sometimes the only reference to- 
 some important picture, incident, or undertaking, is to be 
 found casually interpolated in one of his many epistles. 
 From the present letter we learn that about this time he had 
 composed both the words and the music of a glee ; elsewhere 
 there are allusions to his having frequently composed songs,, 
 sometimes to his own words, but generally to those of others. 
 
 ' The Mother and Child ' picture referred to is not the, 
 same canvas as that of the same name which, painted a 
 little later, was bought by Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg,. 
 afterwards King of the Belgians, and is still in the KoyaV 
 Palace at Brussels. Whatever may be the view now held 
 as to Severn's work in Art, there can be no question, as to 
 the high opinion of him entertained by many good judges,', 
 including Galcott, "Westmacott, and the Academician alluded' 
 to in the following letter : — 
 
 " Your music has been a feast to me. My love for you has made me 
 think it equal to Purcell's. You have been "very fortunate in finding' 
 such very fine words (mind I am" speaking of the song): it is certainly a 
 very poetical subject. The originality of your musical setting has struck 
 me more than the excellent and even learned Harmonies. One thing! 
 
SEVEBN AS A MUSICIAN. 139 
 
 strikes me as a defect, that the accompaniment is made too much of. It 
 sometimes is independent and even interrupts the subject. Now, an 
 accompaniment should be to assist the theme, by clothing its nakedness. 
 Since I came to Italy I have been move than ever convinced that the 
 accompaniments to a song should be very simple. Are not Mozart's? 
 Perhaps Haydn's are not in such a good taste, they are too complex. Your 
 song in this respect has too much the character of a symphony or over- 
 ture. Look at Purcell in his songs, and you will find that he does not put 
 forth all his strength in harmony. It strikes me that the symphony 
 or chorus is where all this knowledge is to be shown, but a song is to- 
 be beautiful in its simplicity. I sometimes think that a musician might- 
 now be very original, by writing quite in the early simple style, because 
 that style is still very much admired, and would be also in the works of a 
 modern composer. In painting it is so, and it is the most difficult thing 
 to acquire. All the effect produced by bravery in the art-r-such as great 
 knowledge of the mechanism, violent contrast, and strong expressions, 
 are easily produced, and what all can and do produce — but to accomplish 
 that gentle loveliness of expression, touching most by simplicity, and 
 that simplicity always touching the heart — this is the true thing, and 
 what few, and none but those who by great striving against the ostentatious 
 display of all their knowledge, can produce. Yet these are the works 
 that all love, that belong to all ages, that are the chief works in every 
 art, where they primarily address themselves to the heart and not the head. 
 " Now, my dear Tom, I am saying all these things because I know 
 it is the case with you musicians to make your beautiful pursuit only for 
 your own comprehension, that is, in its highest parts. I have heard 
 musicians continually say that the Fngue is a thing (and many other 
 parts of music) that was never meant to be relished hut by those very 
 learned in the science. This must be a mistake. It cannot be good if it 
 does not affect those who may be ignorant of the science and yet have 
 very great feeling. Of the finest kind are Haydn's Symphonies — they 
 affect all, the unlearned and learned equally. There are subjects in them 
 for the delight of the most common, mind, yet are not less estimated by 
 the musicians. 
 
 " You must tell me if you know the gentleman who wrote this fine 
 song. Mr. Brown seemed very much struck with it. If you do know him 
 personally I would advise you to set the highest value on his acquaint- 
 anceship, for he is a man not only of genius but of most beautiful taste. 
 I am most anxious to hear that you do know him. 
 
 " So now I have had my say about you I will say something about 
 myself. First, I have been rather ill from a cold which brought on a 
 jaundice ; now the yellow is gone, and I am nearly recovered, for I have 
 such a fine fellowship in my good friend Mr. Brown, who is living in 
 my house. We cook, and are completely at home ; perhaps this has 
 tended to keep away those horrid attacks of indigestion, which have 
 ceased since October twelvemonth. In my painting I have made great 
 progress, thank God ! owing to my journey to Venice. My large picture 
 
140 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 of 'Alexander' is just completed, and I think seems to be liked. It 
 has teen a great labour. The subject I mentioned for my next — of 
 Lorenzo di Medici — I must give up for the present. I have now been 
 studying a long time, and got to a profound knowledge of the most difficult 
 and essential parts of painting, and when I painted the ' Alcibiades ' I 
 found myself so deficient in almost every point that I have since set to 
 most seriousty. I felt that my pension was given me for this purpose, 
 and that although I could paint pictures and be getting on, yet I was 
 determined to make myself equal to the execution of works with facility. 
 
 " Now I have chosen the subject of a Mother and Child. They were 
 occupied in making wreaths ; the child, gathering flowers, had strayed to 
 the very edge of a precipice, when, had the mother spoken, much less 
 have reached forward, the infant would have dropped. The mother, in 
 this dreadful moment, shows her bosom, and the infant involuntarily, 
 wants to go to her. I shall have in this picture a beautiful landscape. 
 Mr. Cook, the E.A., has visited me many times, and the other day in my 
 absence he told Mr. Brown that I should certainly be one of the greatest 
 English artists, and he said this without hesitation. This has given me 
 courage, as Mr. Cook is one of the Council of the Eoyal Academy. He 
 seems very much satisfied with what I have done. We are going together 
 to [paint?] in the Vatican. Now they are beginning to talk to me about 
 commissions. I daresay this winter I shall receive some order to paint a 
 picture. I send you a glee which was done for Christmas Day ; both the 
 words and music are mine, but if you like to try your master hand do. 
 Mind the bass is the drunken man moving, except when he speaks. So 
 now, my dear Tom, good-bye, and may God bless and preserve you. 
 
 " Your affectionate brother, 
 
 " J. S." 
 
LETTER FROM RICHARD WESTMACOTT. 141 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Letter from Eicliard Westraacott — Brown's new home — Severn goes to the 
 Alban Hills — Massimo d'Azeglio— Severn's friendships through Keats 
 — Mr. Buskin, Mr. Gladstone, &c. — Letter from Charles Brown about 
 Geo. Keats — -Goes with Lady Westmorland to Naples — Miss Cotterell 
 again— His life in Kome — Gibson : Westmacott : Seymour Kirkup ; 
 Hazlitt, &c. — Severn meets his future wife — A strange story of Papal 
 Borne — A terrible tragedy — Severn's marriage — Letter from Trelawny — 
 The projected Keats memorial — Letters from Severn about Keats — 
 Severn's wish to see ' Otho ' acted — Eager for a monument to Keats 
 — Prolific in Art-work — -Birth of Walter Severn — Severn's famous 
 Cathedral-picture — His prosperity — Letters from Brown and B. West- 
 macott — Severn and Sir Walter Scott— Brown meets Monckton Milnes. 
 — Letter from Leigh Hunt. 
 
 The year 1824 found Severn thoroughly at home in Rome,, 
 and determined to remain there at any rate for some years. 
 There was reasonable prospect, by this time, of his making- 
 enough by his brush to support himself; if he failed, he could 
 return to London, he wrote, and take to musical criticism, 
 and even undertake what Keats called " the theatricals." 
 
 The spring was mainly occupied by him in love-making 
 and work. The former came to nothing, though he seems 
 to have had a genuine, if not very deep attachment to 
 the young English girl who had fascinated him. A few 
 months later, however, she left Italy for England, and he 
 never saw her again. It does not appear that there was' 
 more than one " wounded heart." 
 
 In May he heard from Richard Westmacott Jr., who was 
 then paying his first visit to Venice. 
 
 "Venice, 
 
 "May 20th, 1824. 
 "My dear Severn, 
 
 " Eceomi qua at last — full of wonder and admiration of the famed; 
 tho' fallen spouse of the Adriatic. I have always studiously avoided looking 
 at views, or reading, or listening to descriptions of Venice, wishing to. 
 
142 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 come upon it at once without any prejudice, and if possible to save myself 
 a disappointment upon seeing the original, after reading some account of 
 it, like Eustace's and Piranesi's of Rome, which we all agree are humbugs, 
 and only lead one astray. I have been well repaid for waiting for the reality 
 — any description must fall short of it — my imagination sometimes gets 
 upon stilts, and I had, of course, fancied a sort of a city in the water, with 
 latticed windows, orange trees, gondolas, &c, &c, but I had not neared the 
 original. I came from Ferrara by water, and I think few things can be 
 more beautiful than the scene that presented itself as soon as we entered 
 the principal canal of Venice. It was about four o'clock in the evening, 
 and the weather- — tho' the sky was not quite Italian — very fine. I can't 
 tell you how I felt as we cut through the water. I was full of Desdemona, 
 Shylock, Pierre, Belvidere, old Dandolo, and fifty other delightful and 
 interesting associations ; but you have seen it all, and are just the sort of 
 chap to enjoy it, so I need not tease you with any details of the xuliat nor 
 the why I admired. As soon as I could I saw the Bialfo, then S. Mark, 
 then the Bridge of Sighs, ' on either side a Palace and a Prison ; ' in fact, 
 from the time of my arrival I have been running about devouring what- 
 ever came in my way. I am now driven in by darkness and fatigue, but 
 before going to my couch have resolved to keep my promise of writing to 
 my dear Giuseppe. Mr. Brown told me he had written to you. I 
 suppose he told you of my having proceeded almost immediately on my 
 arrival at Florence to Carrara. I returned in a few days, and was glad to 
 avail myself of his kind offer of an introduction to Leigh Hunt. I saw but 
 little of him, unfortunately for me, but that little made me regret that our 
 acquaintance was so lately made and so soon to be interrupted. I spent 
 much of my last day in Florence with him and Mr. Brown in the Vale of 
 the Belle Donne, which we all enjoyed very much — could I have remained 
 longer in dear Tuscany we should have spent many pleasant days 
 "together I daresay, for Mr. Brown is just the man to be happy with, and 
 I feel I should have liked Mr. Hunt more and more every time I met 
 him. I saw the Brunino, and think him a very fine little fellow ; your 
 miniature is certainly very like him. He spoke nothing but Italian, and 
 his papa — like all papas — is not a little proud of him. I thought our old 
 plague, Johnny Hunt, looked very ill. I think he must be improved, for 
 altho' he tried to bolt up to me with his taking, irinocen ^-sounding 'Ah! 
 how d'ye do, Sir ? ' I saw he made himself scarce as soon as possible — poor 
 child ! or, rather, poor parents ! I suspect a bad child is a curse of which 
 we single gentlemen can't even imagine the bitterness. God save us from 
 it if ever we become Benedicts ! I wrote to Mr. MacDonald a week or ten 
 days ago, on business ; I begged him to deliver two or three messages from 
 me to you, Kirkup, and others-; of Kirkup I requested some information 
 of poor Eastlake. I shall go to the Post Office to-morrow to see whether 
 there is any letter for me. Knowing how bad E. was when I left Bome, 
 I feel extremely anxious to hear something of him. I meant to stay here 
 seven or eight days, in which time they tell me I may see Venice pretty 
 well. I am still with Mr. Ciitshell, and it is probable we may make a 
 long journey together. I wish I had a brother artist here, such as your- 
 
BROWN'S NEW HOME. 143 
 
 ■self or Kirkup ; a sculptor ought not to go picture-hunting alone, he loses 
 half the things worth seeing, or frequently passes by a ncm ce male work 
 just for want of knowing where and how to take it. I, however, think 
 myself very fortunate in having found so gentlemanly and agreeable a 
 companion as Mr. Critshell. I never could feel happy nor enjoy anything 
 alone, solus. Had I not had companions from Rome I don't know what I 
 should have done. You recollect what a weeping, miserable, mourning 
 day we had to start on by way of helping me to recover my spirits, Gesu 
 Maria! but Mr. Brown made us all merry, after a fashion, in spite of 
 ourselves — well, I won't imagine I am not to return to Rome next year. 
 A letter lately received from my father is neither one thing nor the other, 
 tut in my mind full of unintelligibles. Sto sperando. God bless you.* 
 
 " Yours truly, 
 
 " Richard Wbstmacott." 
 
 About the same time he received a joyous and character- 
 istic letter from Brown, of which a portion may be quoted. 
 
 " Jfaiano (Florence), 
 
 " May 20th, 1824. 
 "My dear Severn, 
 
 " Do not think me unkind for not having until this time made 
 you acquainted with a matter of the utmost moment concerning myself. 
 Indeed, it would have been useless in me to ask your advice on such a 
 point, as no opinion of yours could have changed my resolution. You, 
 who know me well, must be aware that though I have heedlessly, perhaps 
 "too heedlessly, gained among my friends and associates a character at 
 times approaching to folly and buffoonery (for which I am now as 
 repentant as I ought to be), yet that I have always, beneath that trivial 
 "behaviour, entertained the most serious reflections ; you, I say, know this 
 ■well, and ought not to be surprised at the step I have taken. My future 
 happiness has been the constant idea in my mind ever since I left you ; 
 and hating as I do the vain and gaudy glitter of this world, and feeling 
 that nothing but a religious retirement can give ease to my soul, I have 
 ■determined to enter a convent. I am now bound by law to remain there 
 for five months, and at the end of that period I cannot believe I shall 
 once desire to bid adieu to so blissful a habitation. Before this reaches 
 you I shall have entered within its holy walls. Hunt speaks very kindly 
 to me under the circumstances — I know he means kindly — but nothing 
 he can say shall make me waver ; indeed, it is now too late. ■ My Italian 
 friends, Gianetti and Magini, when I first acquainted them with this 
 ■change in my situation, not only refused to believe me, but when I 
 assured them of the fact, they began — would you credit it ? — to jeer me ; 
 
 * The reader may care to turn from this letter, recording first impres- 
 sions of Venice, by the sculptor, Westmacott, in 1824, to that by the 
 painter, Richmond, in 1839 (pp. 189-191, post), and to that by the critic, 
 Ruskin, in 1843 (pp. 205-7, post). 
 
144 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEBN. 
 
 yet, what was their astonishment when I let them into the secret that I 
 was going to live in a Convent of Nuns ! Tol-de-rol-Iol ! Fal-lal-lal-la ! 
 Yes ! you rogue, I have taken half a suppressed Nunnery for a villa, with 
 four rooms and a pantry and a kitchen on the first. I am buying 
 furniture at a swinging rate. By-the-by, I occupy the Abbess's apart- 
 ments. Charlie and I intend to be as merry as grigs here. Leigh Hunt 
 talks of taking the other half of the Nunnery next October. I pay only 
 31£ crowns per annum. I forgot to tell you I've a glorious romping place, 
 as big as a ball-room, at the top of the house. Did I take you in as you 
 read the former page? Yes, Severn, thoughts of my future happiness 
 make me retire to this convent." 
 
 A letter written by Severn about midsummer to bis fatber 
 gives tbe origin of bis ' King Lear,' certainly one of tbe 
 best pictures tbe artist ever painted. It was a fortunate 
 year for bim, for be received anotber and very generous 
 commission from bis friend Mr. Crauford, wbo bad pre- 
 viously enabled bim to go to Florence by commissioning 
 bim to paint tbe ' Madonna della Sedia ' at tbe Pitti. 
 Moreover, from a letter to bis sister Maria, written about 
 tbe same time, it appears tbat be was asked by Lady West- 
 morland to paint six pictures illustrative of scenes or 
 episodes in ' Quentin Durward.' 
 
 When tbe summer heats made residence in Rome no 
 longer a pleasure, be began to make ready for bis long- 
 projected expedition to the Alban slopes, in order to paint 
 his ' Italian Vintage.' He was aware of the reputation of 
 the women of Genzano and L'Ariccia for beauty and grace, 
 and he decided to reside at one or the other for a time. 
 Ultimately he chose L'Ariccia, as the healthier and more 
 picturesque. 
 
 In that lovely country which stretches along the flanks 
 of the Alban Hills, from Frascati to Velletri, every one 
 must feel as a poet and see as a painter. There is a beauty 
 about tbe lakes of Albano and Nemi, and the wooded 
 valleys and volcanic uplands which environ them, of a 
 fascination absolutely unique. 
 
 It was to this ideal country that Severn prepared to 
 betake himself, and though then as now either Frascati or 
 Albano offered tbe most obvious advantages, be believed he 
 would be freer in the pursuit of his work, more fortunate in 
 
PORTRAIT-STUDY OP A LADY OF GENZANO, MADE IN 1824. 
 
 To face page 144. 
 
MASSIMO D'AZEGLIO. H5 
 
 results, and at less expense to his purse, if lie settled at 
 Genzano or L'Ariccia. Genzano was the better known and 
 the larger : but, despite its lofty seat, it had a bad reputa- 
 tion for fever, and it had neither the quietness nor the 
 distinctiveness of its neighbour. Severn had already made 
 a sketch in oils of his proposed picture. The latter was to 
 be a large upright canvas, with vines growing up an elm ; 
 the men on the branches of the tree to be severing the 
 grape-clusters and lowering them to the women standing 
 below, with outspread aprons to catch the grape-drift. 
 
 When he had first gone thither, he writes that he found 
 the handsome Genzano peasant-women obdurate ; and that 
 he was driven to the expedient of making known secretly 
 that his picture was only a pretence, and that in truth he 
 had come to select a wife from among them. The expedient 
 was successful. Every girl and unmarried woman wanted 
 to be painted by the young Signor Pittore Inglese. " In this 
 happy turn of affairs, I did twelve figures for my picture — 
 ,and these were afterwards considered in Eome to be the 
 most striking studies that had ever been done of Roman 
 peasants by any contemporary." 
 
 At L'Ariccia Severn became acquainted with an Italian 
 gentleman who then and later showed him much kindness. 
 This was the Marchese d'Azeglio, who ultimately invited 
 the young artist to reside in his house till he had finished 
 his work upon or for the ' Vintage.' 
 
 " This is the same nobleman," writes Severn, " who has since become 
 so famous as a politician, in forming and perfecting the Constitutional 
 Government of Sardinia.* He was then a, most gentlemanlike and 
 
 * Massimo Taparelli, Marquis of Azeglio, best known simply as Massimo 
 d'Azeglio, was five years younger than Severn, and so in his twenty- 
 sixth year when the two met. His father had come to Eome in 1813, as 
 Ambassador from the King of Sardinia, and he had accompanied him. 
 In 1822 he returned by himself, and spent some seven or eight years in or 
 near Borne, devoting himself to painting and literary study and composi- 
 tion. It was daring this period that Severn knew him. Later, he 
 married the daughter of the illustrious Manzoni. His famous national 
 romance, ' Ettore Pieramosco,' was published in 1833, and was followed by 
 many other important and widely influential writings. After a long and 
 noble career as painter, author, soldier, patriot, and statesman, he became 
 Prime Minister to the King of Sardinia. 
 
146 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEHX. 
 
 accomplished companion, and I passed some weeks in his company most 
 agreeably and profitably. We seldom talked politics, and our conversa-- 
 tions were mostly on history, poetry, or art— for in painting he himself 
 excelled, and was indeed at that very time engaged upon an historical 
 landscape. He was a tall, dignified man, rather fair for an Italian, and so 
 far as I could judge more English than Italian in his sympathies and. 
 tastes.* He was well learned in our history, and, indeed, in that of every 
 other country, and it was one of the fascinations of his conversation that 
 he could with ease and elegance go at once from ancient to modern 
 history, or vice versa, and in this enviahle range could combine the history 
 of any country in a most charming and illustrative way. One thing 
 struck me as characteristic of him, a marked dislike of Popery — indeed, 
 his whole mental attitude was founded upon this dislike and distrust ; not? 
 that he confessed to Protestantism, but simply that he could not but 
 regard Popery as the source of modern Italian misery." 
 
 Naturally, this acquaintanceship meant much to Severn,, 
 and it was one he was wont to recall with pride and pleasure 
 when in after years the name of Massimo d'Azeglio was in 
 every one's mouth. 
 
 The ' Italian Vintage ' occupied the greater part of a year 
 befpre it was finished. It was purchased for the Duke of 
 Bedford by his brother, Lord William Eussell. The general 
 idea at that time as to the monetary value of modern pictures 
 was neither flattering to Art nor encouraging to artists. 
 Severn was asked by Lord William Eussell, after his large 
 picture (the sixteen figures in which were half life-size, and 
 with what the painter calls a background of extensive land- 
 scape) had been bought by agreement, to name his price. 
 The moderate sum of £150 was asked. Lord William Eussell 
 wrote that he thought the price extravagant, and declared 
 that from his long acquaintanceship with young artists, he 
 could say that the price bore no comparison with what was- 
 generally asked. 
 
 " I answered that I had no knowledge of other artists' prices, but I 
 wished and was obliged to live by my profession ; that I had carefully 
 reckoned the length of time which I had been engaged upon the picture,, 
 and the many expenses to which I had been put ; and that, in a word, 
 
 * Severn at this time knew nothing of the anti-papal, or rather 
 patriotic Italian party, and for long after the rising of Victor Emmanuel's 
 star, he practically adhered to the Papal dominion, notwithstanding his 
 indignation with and even abhorrence of its incapacity, weakness, and too- 
 frequently conspicuous iniquity. 
 
SEVERN'S FRIENDSHIPS THROUGH KEATS. 147 
 
 the price would barely cover all. He was satisfied, and even pleased, 
 with my answer, and the Duke himself wrote that he thought the price 
 moderate." 
 
 While still in the hill-country he heard again from 
 Brown : — 
 
 " George Keats has written a very long letter to Dilke, to exculpate 
 himself from the charge against him, and expressing himself as very 
 angry that ever it was made. Dilke thinks his letter conclusive in his 
 favour, and sends me the heads of it. I am sorry I cannot agree with 
 him, as his assertions are directly in opposition not only to what John 
 Keats said (who might on money affairs be easily in error) but to what 
 Mr. Abbey told me. Therefore I have asked Dilke, in order to clear up 
 all doubt, to call on Mr. Abbey, and procure his further explanation. Should 
 it appear that George is guiltless, I will not only inform you, but endeavour 
 to do him justice with every one in my power. He owns, for the sake of 
 John's feelings, that he voluntarily deceived him ; making him believe he 
 was at times richer than he was, and also that he was borrowing money 
 from him ; John's consequent destitution of course made others acquainted 
 with this, and therefore how can George, however innocent, be surprised 
 at the charge having been made against him, grounded, as it was, on his 
 own words and deeds ? This I think so strange that it is only possible. 
 Indeed, he makes out that when he first went to America John had not a 
 penny, and that he (George), tinder pretence of adjusting accounts, gave 
 him £300, without John knowing anything of such a gift. When he 
 went for the second time to America, he says he took from him only £170, 
 so that, by his account, John had been the better for his brotherhood to the 
 amount of £130. Mr. Abbey's story to me differed in sums and fact* 
 from George's. What think you of this ? " 
 
 In October he was still at L'Ariccia, for on the 4th he 
 wrote to his sister Maria ; and from his record of his doings 
 he certainly seems to have been indefatigable. He there 
 turned his musical faculty to account, and appears to have 
 fulfilled the part of organist at the church to his own and 
 others' satisfaction. It is interesting to learn that at this 
 early date, "Keats's name was rising," for though the 
 ' Adonais ' had drawn attention to him, it cannot be said 
 that in England he was at all widely known, while there is 
 evidence that the sale of his writings flagged sometimes to 
 nothing for months. The unexpected reward which his 
 devotion to Keats had won him was not long delayed in the 
 coming, and it is pleasant to know that, as one instance, so 
 good a judge of art and literature as Mr. Erskine of Lin-> 
 
 1-2 
 
148 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 lathen first took an interest in the young artist, and com- 
 missioned a picture from him, on account of his connection 
 with the poet, whose early death was even then regarded by 
 not a few as a disastrous loss to English literature. Later 
 on, he won the friendship of Mr. Euskin, Mr. Gladstone, and 
 other eminent men, primarily on the same account. " You 
 would be surprised," he writes, " how often I am pointed out 
 here as the friend of Keats." 
 
 The year 1825 was a memorable one for Severn. In that 
 year he formed a friendship with Thomas Uwins,* the 
 .painter, which lasted unbrokenly for thirty-four years, and 
 was fruitful of much good as well as pleasure. Another 
 friendship, also, he gained, that of the Countess of West- 
 morland, of whom he had already seen a good deal ; yet it 
 was one that, though it brought him no little pleasure and 
 advantage, was, later, the source of infinite pain and distress ; 
 ■and in this year, also, he came to know the lady whom, in 
 1828, he married. 
 
 In the summer of this year he went with Lady Westmor- 
 land and other friends to Mola di Gaeta, in the Neapolitan 
 kingdom, and thence, later, he accompanied them to Naples. 
 There he made some further acquaintanceships, one or two 
 of which proved advantageous to him later on ; and there 
 he was glad to see much of Mr. Cotterell, the friend who had 
 shown so many courtesies to Keats and himself from the 
 time when the Maria Crowther arrived in the Bay of Naples 
 till the day when they had set forth on their journey to 
 Eome. He found to his regret that Miss Cotterell, who had 
 at first benefited by the change of, climate, had died of 
 consumption. She had heard of Keats's sufferings and death, 
 and. with surprise as well as regret, for she had believed 
 the young poet had a far better chance for his life than 
 
 * Thomas Uwins, K.A. (1782-1859), was, in early life, like Severn, an 
 apprentice to an engraver ; but at the age of sixteen he became an art- 
 student. In 1814 he went to live in the South of France, and in 1824 to 
 Italy, where he stayed till 1831. He was elected R.A. in 1838 ; and 
 Keeper of the National Gallery in 1847. He was an able and successful 
 painter. 
 
LETTER FROM CHARLES BROWN. 14ft 
 
 she had for hers. She had been much attracted by Keats 
 during the long voyage they had made in company. As 
 for Mr. Cotterell, he shared her admiration and liking, and 
 not to the exclusion of Severn. He was one of the few 
 people at that time who were fully aware of the treasure 
 possessed in ownership of the first editions of Keats's 
 books. 
 
 In the autumn Severn returned to Eome and assiduously 
 began to make up for lost time. There is no doubt that 
 he gained much at this time from his frequent intercourse 
 with Gibson, Westmacott, Seymour Kirkup, and others. 
 In reply to a long chatty letter about what was happening 
 in Eome, in his own circle rather, — how in addition to his 
 sculptor-friend Gott and his family, a Captain Baynes had 
 joined their company ; some gossip about a new ' relationship ' 
 of Kirkup's in Rome ; about the despatch, to Brown's care, 
 of his twenty-guinea " man on horseback, brother, and dog ; " 
 and, chiefly, a request for his friend's advice upon one or 
 two moot points in the problem of what constitutes Art and 
 artistic selection, — he received the following letter from 
 Brown, with its excellent response on the main point. 
 
 " I must tell you Hazlitt is here, and will shortly, so he says, proceed 
 to Eome, where he is to study your favourite Eaphael and Michael, and 
 write a book on them. He will be accompanied by his wife. It is his 
 wish to have a letter to you, which he certainly shall have. Don't let 
 this news cause trepidation among the artists, though, it must be con- 
 fessed, an Edinburgh reviewer is a, formidable sort of person, and his 
 pen is not one of the finest nibbed. I think you will like him extremely, 
 and, between ourselves, he may be of the utmost service to you in your 
 profession, as far as its patronage is concerned ; and already he has a high 
 opinion of your talents. 
 
 "What you ask about your painting, I think is easily answered. 
 Painting is as poetry, where the art is to concentrate ideas, and to 
 embellish common events through the medium of the imagination. Your 
 naked boys treading the ripe grapes form a beautiful subject, sufficiently 
 natural, because it is not too far removed 'from possibility. A man 
 soiling the grapes, as I should call it, is an unworthy object for painting, 
 purely because it is unpleasant, however undoubtedly in nature. In 
 poetry and painting, things are not to be represented as they positively 
 exist, for there is not an entire pleasure in them in that view ; but they 
 should be embellished to the utmost, always however in taste, and in the 
 
150 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 feeliDg of the subject. Those who object to your boys, should, on the 
 same principle, object to so many beautiful women assembled at 
 the same moment in the same vintage — both are improbable, only the 
 boys are less so. God has given us a real world and an imaginary one — 
 both lovely and both perfect ; and He has also given us the power to 
 relieve our minds by flying from one to the other, and by mingling them 
 at our will for our delight. The last beloDgs especially to the poet and 
 the painter ; when they fail to take advantage of it, they become matter- 
 ©f-fact gentlemen, who vise their fine words and their fine colours to no 
 purpose. Your man is a matter-of-fact ; your boys a touch of poetry. 
 The former a disagreeable reality, the latter a brilliant probability, a 
 threading of the imagination through the dull course of common events. 
 Tour owd natural feeling led you to the beautiful, the poetic, and your 
 fear of infringing on the usual mode, the common one, has startled you. 
 Have I satisfied you ? " 
 
 It was about this time that Severn met, and was at once 
 strongly attracted by Miss Elizabeth Montgomerie, Lady 
 Westmorland's ward. In one of his ' Reminiscences ' he 
 speaks of this events as having occurred towards the end of 
 1825, but other evidence, together with an allusion in a 
 letter from Brown, written in August of the same year, and 
 hints in his home-letters, prove that he must have met 
 Miss Montgomerie during or shortly after the Christmas 
 season of 1824r-25, if not, indeed, earlier. 
 
 " It was [in the early winter of] 1825," he writes, " that I had the first 
 sight of my future wife, during a visit of respect which, in company with 
 [Sir] Charles Eastlake, I was making to the Countess of Westmorland, 
 who was then residing in the Palazzo Bospigliosi. This young lady 4 
 ostensibly the adopted daughter of Lady Westmorland, was the orphan 
 <;hild of General Lord Montgomerie, who had died in 1803, while the 
 army of which he was in command was in Sicily. Miss Montgomerie, 
 who had come to Eome with Lady Westmorland, or had joined her 
 there, soon interested everyone among the Countess's friends ; and this 
 perhaps, not so much by her highly born beauty and a certain gentleness 
 ■ef manner, as by her position as protegee of such an animated specimen, 
 or rather fiery particle of womanhood, as the Countess certainly was — as 
 the adopted daughter of the most remarkable Englishwoman then resident 
 in Eome. 
 
 "This impulsive, arrogant, dictatorial, but witty and brilliant woman 
 was cursed with another turbulent tendency ; namely, to pay no regard 
 to times and seasons. Night would sometimes be day, and day njght, to 
 her too compulsive mind. A natural consequence was that this un- 
 commonplace lady was often asleep when everybody else was awake or 
 tried to be. Hence arose her custom to make Miss Montgomerie act 
 
GROUP FOK "THE FOUNTAIN," PAINTED AT L'ARICCIA, 1825. 
 
 One work so-named belongs to the King of the Belgians, and one to 
 the Marquis of Lansdowne. 
 
 To face page 161. 
 
SEVEBN MEETS EIS FUTTJBE WIFE. 151 
 
 entertainer (and detainer) to any guest who should make an informal call, 
 while she hurriedly or leisurely made her toilette." 
 
 Severn enters into full and prolonged details about the 
 charms of the lady who was to become his wife, about his 
 sensations when he first met her, about the growth of his 
 regard to affectionate sympathy and thence to love : with, 
 incidentally, an occasionally entertaining but irrelevant 
 chronigue scandaleuse. Most of all this may be omitted 
 from this narrative. Miss Montgomerie was really a 
 beautiful girl, and certainly unhappy with her intolerant 
 guardian. She was attracted by the handsome young 
 artist (and Severn at this time must have been exception- 
 ally winsome and good-looking) and won by his courtesy, 
 sympathy, and admiration. He, for his part, though he 
 confesses to " a gay and elastic temperament which had led 
 me to suppose marriage was not altogether my forte," was 
 touched by the girl's real loneliness, by her evident un- 
 happiness under Lady Westmorland's tyrannical rule, and 
 by her beauty. It was, with him (though he does not seem 
 to have quite realised it for some time), a case of love at 
 first sight. 
 
 " When I left this lovely vision after that first brief 
 interview," he says, " my life seemed to have taken on a 
 new form, and I was impelled to shape it anew ; it was like 
 the lump of shapeless clay in the sculptor's hands, and I 
 was the sculptor filled with vague conceptions of fresh 
 ■creation." 
 
 A lengthy period, however, was to pass before Severn 
 asked Miss Montgomerie to promise to be his wife, a request 
 which was granted on condition of the betrothal being kept 
 secret till the marriage could be arranged. Miss Mont- 
 gomerie feared Lady Westmorland's displeasure, and it is 
 quite clear that Severn was by no means willing to incur 
 it, if honourably avoidable. The fears of both were, as a 
 matter of fact, well founded. 
 
 But meanwhile Severn was not idle at his easel. Besides 
 another ' Fountain ' — with the landscape background taken 
 from a grotto and a grove of trees in the G-iugi Park at 
 
.152 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 L'Ariccia — he was busy with several important under- 
 takings. 
 
 Writing to his brother Tom on the last day of 1825, he 
 concludes his long letter with these notable words : — 
 
 " I have now been in Italy five years — it seems impossible. Betwixt 
 you and me, certainly I gained more from poor Keats, who is dead and 
 gone, than from aDy other source. He introduced me to all the learned 
 men I know, and helped me on in my painting by his own great mind ; 
 and then my name is so interwoven with his friendship and death that it 
 will ever be an honour to me." 
 
 A few weeks later he received a visit from Walter Savage 
 Landor, who on going to Rome bore a special letter from 
 Brown to Severn. Landor and Severn at all times enjoyed 
 each other's society. 
 
 Room must be found for the following amusing anecdote 
 about Turner, from one of Thos. Uwins's many letters of 
 this date to Severn. 
 
 "The impression that Turner's pictures seem to have made on the 
 English travellers as well as the foreign artists, appears very unfavourable, 
 if I may judge from the reports. How is all this? are they deficient in 
 the high qualities that used to distinguish his former works, or is he 
 trifling with his great powers ? The following simple account of him has 
 amused me riot a little. It is written me by a merchant travelling 
 towards Bologna, a young man who knows nothing of art, and nothing, 
 as you perceive, of the reputation of artists. 
 
 " ' I have,' he writes, ' fortunately met with a good-tempered, funny little 
 elderly gentleman, who will probably be my travelling-companion through- 
 out the journey. He is continually popping his head out of window to 
 sketch whatever strikes his fancy, and became quite angry because the con- 
 ductor would not wait for him whilst he took a sunrise view of Macerata. 
 " Damn the fellow ! " says he, " he has no feeling." He speaks but a few 
 words of Italian, about as much of French, which two languages he 
 jumbles together most amusingly. His good temper, however, carries 
 him through all his troubles. I am sure you would love him for his 
 indefatigability in his favourite pursuit. Prom his conversation he is 
 evidently near kin to, if not absolutely an artist. Probably you may 
 know something of him. The name on his trunk is J. W. or J. W. M. 
 Turner!'" 
 
 During the summer Severn wrote to his brother Tom, 
 that his picture of 'Lear and Cordelia' was wanted by 
 three would-be purchasers, one of them the Duke of 
 

 
 
 ■4 ™ 
 
 S a 
 
 a 
 O 
 
-i &1BANGE STOUT OF PAPAL HOME. 153 
 
 Bedford ; and adds that he was then painting nothing but 
 what was commissioned. A little later he wrote again : 
 
 " Amongst my best news, you will be glad to know that I have made a 
 good friend and patron in Prince Leopold. He has just sent me a most 
 kind letter from Paris, offe'ring me his services and assuring me of his 
 esteem, and, what is better, ordering me to paint him another picture, and 
 what is better still, telling mo I may receive the money when and how I 
 please. Now all this is most princelike. My works are to be placed in 
 Manchester House ; there now, think of that ! If you, my dear Tom, 
 think that being introduced to the Prince Leopold would be of service to 
 you, nothing can be easier for you. As my brother, you will find 
 him receive you well and speak of me like my other friends, for I have 
 known him well here through my friend the Countess of Westmorland, 
 and he seems very desirous to serve me. My friends here tell me that I 
 shall get an order from our King through these means. Think of that ! 
 Am I not a lucky dog ? Who would have thought all this of such a poor 
 fellow as I was ? why, I am like to become downright illustrious ! 
 * ' * * * * » 
 
 " I am living very well here. If only Keats was here it would be 
 delightful — for by this time I am quite accustomed to the place." 
 
 I may close this account of the main incidents in Severn's 
 life in 1827, by extraction from one of his MS. ' Reminis- 
 cences' of a vivid and strange account of a terrible event 
 that happened at that time in Koine, an event which had 
 important consequences both in Rome and upon the Papal 
 policy, and would have created excitement throughout the 
 civilized world had not extraordinary precautions been taken 
 (at the time of the priest's confession) to prevent any de- 
 finite information getting into the Foreign press. Even 
 letters, it was asserted, underwent a rigorous scrutiny. I 
 give Severn's account practically in his own words. 
 
 "A marvellous and horrible execution took place in Home in 1827, 
 which I beheld most unwillingly. I was returning from the Vatican 
 across the fields,* and had just crossed the Ripetta ferry, when an immense 
 crowd which was moving onward to the Piazza del Popolo irresistibly bore 
 me with it. I discovered that the cause was a criminal going to execu- 
 tion, and although I had long determined never to be witness of such a 
 scene, yet the wild fury of the crowd carried me along off my feet : and on 
 finding myself at the Piazza del Popolo, bewildered with the scene, I got 
 
 The Prati di Castello, now alas ! ruined by the jerry-builder. 
 
154 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 * 
 
 into a booth which was being elected for the Carnival, and so had a 
 complete command of the whole Piazza. It was soon made known to me 
 that the culprit was a lad of eighteen, accused of the murder of a 
 Monsignore, which by the Eoman law is punishable by death by the 
 hammer. There was a universal feeling of pity in the crowd, and it was 
 evident that the Eoman people did not think it possible that such a youth 
 •could have committed such a crime, for he was described to me as a 
 simple, harmless lad, employed as an under-servant in the murdered 
 Prelate's house, and physically and morally unequal to such an atrocious 
 deed. He was conveyed in a cart, handcuffed, with two priestly con- 
 fessors holding a crucifix close to him, and apparently in close and intense 
 •communication with him in the hope of forcing his confession of guilt. 
 This he steadfastly refused to make, and with tears and solemn protesta- 
 tions declared his entire innocence. All this interested me in his favour, 
 and when he was led forward and up to the scaffold blindfold I felt 
 -assured that he must be innocent, for everything, even to Ms general 
 appearance and terrified and almost convulsed features, overwhelmingly 
 pointed to that conclusion, and unmistakably he was a lad of the most 
 simple character. The executioner was provided with a long square piece 
 of iron about two inches thick, also a large knife. He began by forcing 
 "the poor screaming lad down on his knees, and then I just saw him raise 
 the iron bar to strike and hammer the boy to death, when I was unable to 
 behold more, and involuntarily turned round. But one tremendous blow 
 I did hear, and knew that the skull was dashed in, for the convulsive 
 groans of the multitude declared it. The agitation and fainting of some 
 and the dismay of all was a sight so superhuman, inasmuch as I saw an 
 expression on the single face of the crowd as it were, such as I never saw 
 before or since, that I could not but conclude (if such an ordeal could 
 jpossibly have any moral good in it), that only the fact of the victim 
 being indisputably an atrocious assassin could warrant even a shadow qf 
 excuse for such a criminal abuse of legal authority. After some minutes, 
 .when I recovered sufficient strength to turn round, the executioner had 
 thrown down the lad's body and was kneeling on it. His left hand was 
 thrust in the broken skull and scattering the brains from it on to the 
 scaffold : while in his right hand he had the large knife and was cutting 
 off the head. On and on he proceeded deliberately to amputate .the limbs, 
 the arms and the legs, while the scaffold was streaming with blood, and the 
 whole figure of the executioner also. When his bloody work was done he 
 packed all the parts together, each in its place, and finished by covering 
 the frightful remains with a mat. Of course I took particular notice of 
 the executioner, his face, his hands, his dress, his top-boots, all I re- 
 member vividly up to this moment. The moral impression on the 
 Eomans was the very contrary of that meant by the Pope. From the 
 outset they had doubted the lad's guilt, as he had been condemned 
 wholly on circumstantial evidence, a doubt that became a conviction 
 because of his simple youthful appearance, and known gentleness of 
 nature. It was everywhere declared, moreover, that at the utmost the 
 
.1 TERRIBLE TRAGEDY. 1 55 
 
 execution should only have been by the usual guillotine. The result was 
 ■a general execration of the Pope's harsh cruelty and ignorant bigotry. 
 
 " About a fortnight later I was crossing the same ferry and fields to go 
 to the Vatican, when I heard a guitar and some singing at the door of an 
 osteria. When I approached I was astonished to see the very executioner 
 in the identical dress and boots tho' clean from blood : further, that this 
 was the man who was gaily playing and singing to women and boys at 
 the table. There was a total abstraction from the atrocious scene of 
 blood that had passed a fortnight before, although the savage strangeness 
 of the execution continued to be the subject of conversation. And here I 
 would stop to remark that in all my Anglo-Eoman experience, and all my 
 enquiries about the various executions, no Italian criminal is ever known 
 to confess. The answer after an execution is invariably ' that he died like 
 a dog,' and this I find extends to most Catholic countries, and is a singu- 
 lar characteristic in the contrast it affords with like episodes in our own 
 country, where it is a rare circumstance to find a criminal dying impeni- 
 tent ; indeed the confession is the interesting part of an English criminal's 
 end. I don't stop to reason about this fact, as the tremendous finale of 
 this murderous ordeal will speak for me. Some six or seven months after 
 the execution, the whole Eoman people were convulsed again by the as- 
 tounding fact, that the attendant-priest on the murdered prelate had just 
 •died, and had confessed the fact that he himself was the murderer. He 
 admitted on his dying oath that he had contrived to put all the appearances 
 of the guilt on the simple lad, had seen his execution, had dined after- 
 wards, and in no way betrayed himself. But he had not lived a comfort- 
 able life, lor it seems his conscience had helped to hasten his death. The 
 Pope, Gregory XVI., was so struck down that it was admitted he fainted 
 at the news, and he certainly shut himself up for some days in absolute 
 seclusion. For the remainder of his reign he would never allow another 
 -execution. Most certainly at the time everyone was against the pre- 
 sumptive guilt of the lad on the scanty evidence, but for the crime of 
 murdering a Prelate the Church imperatively required a victim. Offici- 
 ally, in the Papal Eome of that day, vengeance was importunate, and 
 such a crime could not be left unexpiated, as reverence for the Princes of 
 the Church was regarded as even more essential than reverence for God. 
 I remember Admiral Sir William Parker once saying a striking thing on 
 •my asking him about the execution of Admiral Byng, who was shot for 
 presumptive cowardice. Sir William replied, 'Certainly 'twas a most 
 atrocious act of injustice, but it was the act of a political party, and how- 
 ever it is to be condemned, it has certainly made good admirals of us ever 
 since ' : and he added, ' there cannot be a doubt that the world is so 
 callous about the reform of any bad principle or custom that at last it 
 requires the sacrifice of an innocent individual to bring it about. Then 
 for the first time society becomes sensible of the evil, and of the impera- 
 tive necessity of doing away with it for ever; but without » martyr 
 nothing is ever done, and so it was that with the execution of poor 
 Admiral Byng the whole system of the British Navy was changed.' 
 
156 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 " This striking remark I have often thought of since the Eoman murder 
 and mutilation. Up to that time the Church had held it as a principle of 
 power to punish with unchristian severity any agression done against it, 
 and particularly any affront or violence to its high dignitaries ; but now 
 these matters are treated like other worldly things, and society is improved 
 by the change, and even perhaps somewhat more inclined to the Eoman 
 Church. This principle of the martyrdom of an innocent individual," 
 adds Severn in his MS., " may not only be traced through the history of 
 every country, and of every experience and improvement, but also 
 supremely in the sacrifice made by the blessed Christ himself: for the 
 pagan principle of inhumanity and hard wickedness was such that nothing 
 less was required than that He should die guiltless on the Cross, in order 
 to impress the cruel world with a fact that would call up the novel tender- 
 ness of human nature, the feeling of repentance, the consciousness of our 
 united nature, the dependence on a benevolent Providence against 
 our pagan pride ; all these matters were new to the world and necessary 
 to its present well-being as well as to its ultimate salvation. Sceptics 
 may say that the Christian principle has been abused, that greater 
 cruelty has followed Christ, that the world has only become more 
 cunning; but no doubt they shut their eyes to the truth that there 
 is far more humanity in the woild, as all subsequent history will 
 prove by facts. Even the works of Shakespeare will prove it, for there 
 cannot be a doubt, that the charm he gives us in the noble and elevated 
 principle of his chief personages, the reward he finds for virtue, thq 
 moral he shows in patience and suffering — contrasting so strikingly 
 as it all does with the Pagan authors of Greece and Home, is all derived 
 from the glorious Christian principle. The play of ' Hamlet ' is altogether 
 like the story of Orestes, save that the ghost forbids Hamlet to raise his 
 hand against his guilty mother — ' Leave her to Heaven, and to those thorns 
 that in ber bosom lodge.' This elevated principle may he found in the 
 contrast of classic Pagan authors with those of the Christian era." 
 
 By all which, it may be added, Severn's familiarity with 
 Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, and other " classic pagans," was 
 evidently of the most superficial kind, if it existed at all. 
 
 The year 1828, memorable to Severn as that of his mar- 
 riage, was a prosperous one for him. He had been fortunate 
 in obtaining several good commissions, and, as he wrote 
 home, among the many canvases upon which he was then 
 engaged there was not one but what was "to order." 
 Among these was a picture of a 'Warrior and Lady,' 
 which was painted for the Marquis of Lansdowne, and is 
 now in the present Lord Lansdowne's collection. 
 
 In a letter from Brown, though written on the last day 
 
SEVERN'S MARRIAGE. 157 
 
 of September, there is, strangely enough, not only no allu- 
 sion to Severn's approaching marriage or even any apparent 
 knowledge of that event as likely to be immediate, but he 
 persuades his friend to come to Florence in October to 
 recruit his health. Severn had succumbed to an attack of 
 fever, severe though fortunately short, and he seems to have 
 himself had some idea of going to Florence for a change ; 
 yet, at that time, his marriage was already arranged to take 
 place in October. There is nothing in Brown's letter calling 
 for quotation : it is mainly occupied with the news of the 
 death of his brother Septimus, with messages to Severn 
 from Landor and Kirkup, and from the writer to Eastlake 
 and Gibson. At the end he adds : " Lady Westmorland is 
 here : I trust that's no hindrance to your coming." 
 
 It is unnecessary to go into full detail on the subject of 
 Severn's rupture with Lady Westmorland, and his marriage 
 with Miss Montgomerie. 
 
 He declares that he long endured with the best grace 
 he could Lady Westmorland's autocratic ways with Miss 
 Montgomerie. The latter was often placed in unpleasant, 
 if not even humiliating, positions, the only redeeming 
 point in their favour being the frequent opportunities 
 thereby afforded to the lovers to see each other away from 
 Lady Westmorland's jealous scrutiny. 
 
 The result of the announcement of his coming marriage 
 was that a complete break occurred between Severn and 
 his old-time friend. He saw that it would not do to post- 
 pone the wedding: and as at the same time Miss Mont- 
 gomerie declined to be married from the Palazzo Eospigliosi, 
 and as Lady Westmorland had set nearly every one 
 against her, it was settled that the event should take place 
 in Florence. Severn wrote at once to Brown and other 
 friends, and soon all needful arrangements were made. 
 Till the last moment both he and Miss Montgomerie half 
 anticipated some act of violence or interference on the 
 part of one whom they could not but look upon as their 
 enemy. But as a matter of fact the latter subdued her ill- 
 will for the time being, sufficiently to allow her to be 
 
LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 present at the ceremony, and to give Miss Montgomerie-. 
 away : though once the celebration was over she refused to 
 have anything to do with either. The young people were 
 married by her son-in-law, Lord Burghersh. 
 
 Later on, some weeks after the turn of the year, Severn 
 had a long letter from Seymour Kirkup, from which, among 
 other things, we learn that Severn had no fewer than 
 seventeen commissions on hand. No wonder that he had 
 at last felt justified in marrying. There is an allusion to 
 Trelawny as living with Chas. Brown : and, in a postscript, 
 "they were all lies .about his marriage in Greece, &c, &c." 
 
 Trelawny must have left Florence before midsummer, 
 however, for on the 21st of June he wrote to Severn from 
 Ancona. The letter gives exact indications as to the age- 
 of his little " Greek daughter," Zella : 
 
 " Ancona, 
 
 " June 21st, 1829. 
 "Dear Severn, 
 
 " It's long since we have communed by letters, and longer since we- 
 have met, yet now that we are resident in the same land, I hope to again 
 shake hands with you, and that speedily ; more particularly as I am told 
 you are matched with a gentle and most sweet lady ; now the mystery of 
 alchemy, the discovery of longitude, the phoenix, the philosopher's stone, 
 or the Duke of Milan with his enchanted island, old Sycorax, Caliban, 
 and the rest (I say do you mark me), that I have thought any or all of 
 these were less difficult to find than a woman whom a husband, after a 
 year's possession, really thought perfect, as I am told you do your wife, 
 and have felt no compunctious visitings of the conscience, or chew'd the 
 cud of sweet and bitter memory of their, days of freedom. Well, I wish 
 you joy, and thinking it worth a journey, though to the Antipodes, shalL 
 certainly make a pilgrimage to the shrine where you have garnered up 
 your heart, as doubtless will others from the four quarters of this bale of 
 earth. Mecca, Loretto, and the hoary temples of India will lose their 
 wonted worshippers, and even St. Peter's toe be left green with mould; 
 all worship being transferred to Mrs. Severn, and Shelley's creed of 
 universal love become the sole creed on earth. 
 
 " But the object of my writing, though principally to congratulate you,, 
 is in some degree to serve myself, by requesting you will either through 
 Freeborn and Smith, or Colonel Finch, or in what other manner you in 
 your wisdom think meet, make or get made application to the proper 
 authorities at Rome to commute the period of quarantine which my little 
 daughter Zella will otherwise be condemned to pass in the Lazaret here,, 
 on her arrival from Corfu, from whence I expect her hourly on board an, 
 
THE PROJECTED KEATS-MEMOBIAL. 159' 
 
 Ionian vessel. In your application to the authorities at Rome who 
 preside over the Quarantine regulations you must say the child is only 
 three years of age, and in perfect health now, and insist on the danger 
 of losing her health by long confinement at her delicate time of life, incar- 
 cerated in a comfortless Lazaret. 
 
 "Giving four or five days' grace on application where there is any 
 grounds to go upon, or what is better, where interest is made, is an every- 
 day occurrence, and not a favour that is often refused, so I pray you look 
 about you, for it will be doing me a great favour ; and address me here, to 
 the care of H. Kain, Esq., English Consulate, Ancona, and so farewell. 
 
 " Yours and truly, 
 
 "J. E. Trelawnt." 
 
 Within the first year of his marriage Severn was put to 
 infinite annoyance and heavy expense by an iniquitous con- 
 spiracy to extort money from him for services that were never 
 rendered. A long trial conducted with absolutely grotesque 
 parody of justice, and characterised by shameful perjury and 
 bribery, ensued. The whole affair, he writes, tended much to 
 lower the small remaining prestige of the Pope's temporal 
 government, and was often quoted against His Holiness. 
 
 But long before the final result of the trial, shortly after 
 the shock and worry consequent upon the first gross mis- 
 carriages of justice, indeed, Severn, though still determined 
 to fight his case and thwart his enemies, broke down in 
 health. Ere long he became seriously indisposed. It was 
 at this juncture that he received from the Hon. Henry 
 Edward Fox, Lord Holland's eldest son, an invitation to 
 occupy his vacant villa at Frascati, a welcome suggestion 
 gladly acted upon. Thither the Severns went again in 
 1829, and there, late in the summer, a daughter was born 
 to them and was christened Claudia. 
 
 Towards the end of December, 1829, Brown wrote to 
 Severn, begging for his practical aid in the Keats Memoir, 
 to which Severn replied* on the 17th January. Late in 
 February Brown wrote again, on the subject of the respon- 
 sibility of George Keats in his financial relations with 
 John. It would seem that it was about this time that 
 Brown began in earnest to prepare the long-projected Memoir 
 of Keats. Severn, of course, already knew of his project, 
 and had offered to engrave his own miniature portrait of 
 
160 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Keats, though he had expressed a wish to engrave the 
 original in Miss Fanny Brawne's possession rather than a 
 replica of it. Brown wisely refused to take ihe responsi- 
 bility of this suggested loan from Miss Brawne, and offered 
 the fine copy by himself in his own possession — and this 
 is the one that was ultimately engraved. The generous 
 proposal as to the prospective profits is eminently character- 
 istic of the writer. 
 
 * " It was about four years and a half ago that George Keats sent to 
 Dilke a defence of himself, refuting the ' cruel charge ' (as he called it) 
 which I had made against him. Dilke sent me the purport of it, with a 
 request that I should make you and others acquainted with it. I did so, 
 for I had no evidence by which I could contradict his hold assertions ; 
 though, as I told you in Rome, when you put the question to me, I had 
 no faith in his defence. Now, see the danger of villainy, and by what 
 unlooked-for chances it is laid bare. Having a bundle of papers which 
 belonged to Keats, part in his own handwriting, I lately opened it, on the 
 supposition the papers might assist me in the Memoirs. They were 
 chiefly letters between Keats and his brothers. I threw George's and 
 Tom's aside ; but, after awhile, as if by an invisible hand, a passage in 
 one of George's own letters was turned towards me, which gave the lie 
 direct to the groundwork of his defence ! I then searched further, and 
 found an Ace*. Curr 1 . of Abbey's ; when, by these two documents, I was 
 instantly enabled to prove that every tittle of his defence was false, most 
 impudently and atrociously false. I have sent these proofs to Dilke, 
 requesting him to promulgate them among our acquaintances, that I may 
 be no longer suspected as a rash accuser. How he, who has been so 
 positive in George's favour from the first, will take it, I know not. I 
 expect his answer every day. You may rely on my obeying your orders 
 respecting the papers you have promised. You knew Keats before I did, 
 and perhaps you can give me some account of the development of his 
 mind as a poet. He himself has talked to me a little on this subject ; 
 but, if possible, I would have further information. When did your 
 acquaintance with him begin ? Nearly two months since I wrote to 
 Richards for assistance ; no answer. If I knew how to direct a letter to 
 Haslam, I would apply to him ; can you tell me his address ? or will you 
 write, to him ? When I asked you about the terms for engraving, it 
 never entered my head that you would offer to engrave his miniature ; if 
 you can spare time, this offer of yours is admirable. Respecting the 
 original, in Miss Brawne's possession, I am afraid you cannot have it. 
 Were I to ask her for the loan of it, I believe she would send it ; and that 
 belief makes me the more delicate in asking for it ; besides, I cannot run 
 the hazard of its being lost on the way. No, Severn, I do not feel myself 
 
 * Written after receipt of the letter from Severn given overleaf (p. 161.) 
 
LETTERS FROM SEVERN ABOUT KEATS. 161 
 
 authorised in making that request. I will send you my copy, and the 
 drawing I made from your representation of him a little before his death, 
 together with that foolish little painting I have promised in a short while. 
 I have been very much occupied in Mrs. Medwin's affairs, battling with 
 hankers, and lawyers, with my hands day after day full of documents in 
 Courts of Law ; let this be my apology, especially when I tell you I have 
 been of service to that ill-treated lady, with whom every one in Florence 
 sympathises. I have had much conscientious responsibility on my head, 
 little able to think of anything else. To return to Keats : Dilke urges 
 me, as a proof to the world of my friendship for Keats, and as the only 
 proof that I am not book-making, to declare, from the first, that I will 
 not accept of one penny of the profits which may arise from the Memoirs. 
 I never thought of profit, rather of loss, as I expected to pay a large sum 
 for the engravings. To my mind Dilke's advice is good ; and I intend, 
 you willing, to set out with a declaration that the book is an offering to his 
 fame by you and me, both refusing to partake in the profits. The only 
 question then is, who is to have them ? Should there be any, ought we 
 not to present them to his sister ? It is true she does not want them, and 
 therefore we might dispose of them in some other way, something still 
 conducive to his fame, what say you ? — what have you to propose ? Give 
 my love to Mrs. Severn, and say I am eternally obliged to her for the 
 copy she is making. I am equally surprised and rejoiced to hear of her 
 excellent painting. Carlino also sends his love, with ten kisses to Claudia. 
 Shall we make up a match between them ? Their ages are suitable, — ask 
 Mrs. Severn what she thinks of it. Kirkup is very well — all very well, 
 Did I tell you Marina is married ? I cannot, literally cannot, answer 
 your question about Trelawny. I'm turned whist-player. 
 
 " Yours most sincerely, 
 
 " Charles Bbown." 
 
 Severn's earlier letter of the 17th January may now 
 be given, for convenience' sake, together with several 
 " Keatsian " letters addressed to Brown, though written at 
 considerable intervals apart. Each deals either with the 
 question of the Memoir of, or a monument to, the poet. 
 
 "January 17th, 1830. 
 
 "Tour letter found me in all the glorious confusion of moving. I 
 recognized it as from you, and so put it into my pocket to read in the 
 first quiet moment. I am glad I did so, for its contents affected me much, 
 altho' it was agreeable news, for everything about poor Keats is melan- 
 choly. I am content that this reverse in the fate of his works gives you 
 the occasion to pay a true tribute to his memory, such as I have ever 
 longM should be done, and such as I know you quite able to do. 
 
 " I feel, that if you can get over my defective writing, and promise me 
 (which I know you will) not to expose it to the public as mine (for I 
 am not a little proud of Keats as my friend), that I can supply you with 
 
 M 
 
162 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 ample materials, which. I will write spontaneously, not only as to ^ facts 
 which I have witnessed,' but also as to my own feeling and impression of 
 his beautiful character. I will not expect or oblige you to use anything 
 I write but as you see fit, but I shall expect that you destroy these papers 
 when you have used them, as I feel they must contain invectives against 
 many persons whose enmity, or even notice, I am little anxious to have. 
 
 " Eespecting the portrait I feel differently, and shall be proud to make 
 my appearance before the public as the unchanged friend of Keats, loving 
 his memory now he is dead, as I did himself and his works when he was 
 alive, and this is an honour that no one shall share with me, not even the 
 engraver, for I will take up the graver once more and fancy myself 
 inspired to give his resemblance to the world, faulty as it may be, yet 
 done with all my heart and soul. I think the miniature will make a good 
 engraving, and have already imagined the style of the thing, and long to 
 be about it. It would be necessary to have the one in colours to engrave 
 from, which can soon be had from England, as it is such a Jrifle, — not that 
 I think yours defective in any respect, but it is a great advantage always 
 to engrave from colours when it [is] possible. I take it one great reason 
 why the Italian engravings are so stony and lifeless is because they are 
 copied from mere black and white drawings, whereas there exists a sin- 
 gular power in engraving in the insertion of colours. So pray write 
 immediately for the original in colours, and I will commence the moment 
 I receive it. It may come by the Courier quite safe. ..." 
 
 " Some, 
 
 "April 15th, 1830. 
 
 " . . . . You ask me what shall be done with the profits of our work to- 
 poor Keats's memory. Now I have thought a good deal of it, and am 
 going to propose that we erect a monument to his memory here in Rome 
 to the full extent of the money arising from the sale of the work. I have 
 consulted Gibson, who says that for £200 something very handsome may 
 be made. I have a subject in my mind for the Basso Eilievo, which I 
 think I once mentioned to you before. It is Keats sitting with his half- 
 strung lyre — the three Pates arrest him — one catches his arm — another 
 cuts the thread — and the third pronounces- his end. This would make a 
 beautiful Basso Eilievo, and as the gravestone is so unworthy him, and 
 so absurd (as all people say), and as the spot is so beautiful, I hope you 
 will agree to it. Gibson seem'd very much taken with the idea of placing 
 a work, of his on this spot. 
 
 " I knew Keats as far back as 1813. I was introduced to him by 
 Haslam. He was then studying at Guy's Hospital, yet much inclined to 
 the Muses. I remember on the second meeting he read me the Sonnet on 
 Solitude, in which is the line 
 
 ' To start* the wild bee from the foxglove belL' 
 He was at that time more playful in his manner, the world seem'd to have 
 
 * A misquotation for " startles." 
 
SEVEBN'S WISH TO SEE ' OTEO ' ACTED. 163 
 
 nothing to do with him. Poetry was evidently at that time his darling 
 hope. He disliked the surgery, and complained that his guardian, Mr. 
 Abbey, forced him to it against his will. He was introduced to Mr. Hunt, 
 I think, in 1814 or '15, which wrought a great change in him. It con- 
 firmed him in his future career, and I think intoxicated him with an 
 excess of enthusiasm which kept by him four or five years, perhaps until 
 you knew him. This was injurious to him, as Hunt and others not only 
 praised his works and spoke of them as faultless, but even advised him to 
 publish them. Now, merit as they then had, they were not fit things to 
 offer to the world, and I have always thought that that publication was in 
 a great measure the reason poor Keats did not sooner acquire the power of 
 finishing his works. At the same time, he got a kind of mawkishness 
 also from Hunt, which to my thinking was a fault, and which he got rid 
 of when he came to live with you. Yet that first volume gives a good 
 idea of his beautiful character — of one who, on his death-bed, acknow- 
 ledged that his greatest pleasure, in almost every period of his life, had 
 been in watching the growth of flowers and trees — and it [was] thro' this 
 medium that he was so profound in the Greek Mythology. At my first 
 acquaintance with him he gave me the compleat idea of a Poet — 'twas an 
 imagination so tempered by gentleness of manner and steady vivacity, 
 that I never saw him without arguing on his future success. At that 
 time he had no morose feeling, or even idea. He never spoke of any one, 
 but by saying something in their favour, and this always so agreeably and 
 cleverly, imitating the manner to increase your favourable impression of 
 the person he was speaking of. At that time he was not well acquainted 
 with painting, but soon acquired a very deep knowledge of it. Indeed, I 
 used to observe that he had a great power of acquiring knowledge of all 
 kinds, for, after a few years, he used to talk so agreeably on Painting and 
 Music, that I was charmed with him, and have often spent whole days 
 with him devoted to these things. The only difference in his personal 
 appearance at first was that he had not that look of deep thought, but, as 
 I said, his look and manner were more playful. 
 
 " How long shall [you] be occupied on this work ? I would like to 
 know, that I may be ready with the Engraving. The original miniature I 
 should like to have had, for yours, good as it is, will render my engraving 
 a mere copy from a copy — yet I am content and anticipate that I shall 
 succeed. I think the picture well calculated for an engraving . . . 
 
 " I do not know Haslam's address. He knew Keats before I did." 
 
 " Rome, 
 
 " March 14th, 1834.* 
 " Now I don't know what you'll say to the request I am going to make, 
 that you come off to Rome without a moment's delay and bring Keats's 
 
 * Brown at this time was still living in Florence, though illness and 
 financial embarrassments were soon to lead to his departure for England. 
 
 M 2 
 
164 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 tragedy with you. There are here five Englishmen, who have all been 
 together at Cambridge. They are devoted admirers of Keats, and as they 
 are really clever fellows I must confess myself gratified with their atten- 
 tions to me as the friend of Keats. Now you must know that they have 
 been acting — two of them are first-rate — and they made me join them in 
 the 4th Act of the ' Merchant of Venice,' as Gratiano, when I was so 
 much struck with one (Mr. O'Brien) as the very man for Ludolph in 
 Keats's ' Otho.' His voice and manner of reading remind me most 
 forcibly of Keats himself. When I mentioned to them the tragedy, they 
 were all on fire to be at it, but I did not see any hope until I heard from 
 Capt. Baynes, who is also an actor, that we could easily have the beauti- 
 ful private theatre here. I then recollected how much some years since 
 you would have liked to have had the tragedy acted in Rome, when there 
 were private theatricals, and I think how much more you would like it 
 done now by devoted admirers of Keats, good actors, and handsome 
 young men into the bargain. I assure you that I think it would be well 
 done, and as they are all young men of rank, it would certainly be a good 
 report to its forthcoming. Should you not be able to come yourself, nor 
 «ven Charley, to play the Page, cannot you send me the MSS. by the 
 return of post? I will be particular that no copies be taken in any 
 way. 
 
 " Now I wonder what you will say to all this. Is there any possibility 
 that you throw cold water upon it ? 
 
 " And now I am going to wrangle with you. Here I have heard and 
 heard of Keats's Life which you are doing ; I have written and written to 
 you about it, and now I hear nothing more, now, when the world is looking 
 for it, and the tragedy. Why, you would be astonished, were you to know 
 the many who come to me as the friend of Keats, and who idolise him as 
 another Shakespear. 'Tis an injustice to withhold these two works any 
 longer. I remember you said ' the public should never have the tragedy 
 until they have done justice to Keats's other works.' The time has come, 
 and I feae the time may pass. These young men read and recite Keats 
 to me, until I think him more beautiful than ever. (I am dying for them 
 to see the tragedy.) Then there is another point — the Public is wrong 
 about Keats himself. L d . Byron and L. Hunt have most vilely led them 
 astray. I persuade myself that Keats's life will be a most interesting 
 subject. If you will go on, I will send you everything I can think of, and 
 I am sure I can supply much. If you will not, I mean to defy you, and 
 try and write his Life myself, which I am sure will make you look about 
 you .... Now tell me what you have to say by way of excuse. It 
 cannot be, save that you do not know how high Keats's fame has risen — 
 that if he is not the Poet of the million, he is more, for I would say that, 
 judging of the talents of his admirers and their rank as scholars, that his 
 fame is a proud one. So now, my dear Brown, I send this off Saturday 
 ev e — you'll hear Tuesday morn e — and I shall receive the tragedy 
 Saturday." 
 
EAGER FOB A MONUMENT TO KEATS. 165 
 
 " Borne, 
 
 " July 10th, 183G.* 
 
 " .... I inquired about the new edition of Keats, and I was invited 
 to embellish it to any extent, and have some nice ideas for it. Be sure 
 you tell me what movement it makes. Many kind lovers of Keats's poetry 
 offer to subscribe to make him a monument. Gibson made a liberal offer 
 to do it for whatever might be subscribed, which I made known to poor 
 Woodhouse without receiving any answer. Now I have come to the 
 determination that I will accept these subscriptions, and let Gibson make 
 a beautiful monument, either to be placed here or in England. Tell me 
 what are your thoughts, but don't tell me you set your face against it, for 
 so I will have it. 1 can collect a handsome sum. I am an artist myself, 
 and a fine work I'll have. As you have called me an old man, I'll e'en 
 do something to grace my years .... 
 
 " I am just going to write to Mr. Milnes about Keats's tomb. I feel 
 sure that £500 could be easily got, and this, let me tell you, would be 
 useful and even honourable to his reputation. The present gravestone, 
 with its inscription, is an eye-sore to me and more, for as I am sought 
 out and esteem'd as his friend something is look'd for from me, and some- 
 thing I will have. I have thought to have the beautiful profile of 
 Girometti's on the upper part, surrounded with architectural flowers in 
 the Greek style — underneath a bas-relief (the subject of which I have not 
 determined, and will not until you give your ideas, for I'll do nothing 
 without you except your denial — -with that I'll have nothing to 'do). 
 George Keats ought to subscribe, but I have the right, as Keats's last 
 friend, and also as an artist, to the management. After the Monument is 
 up, I'll plant the most beautiful laurels and cypresses ever seen, and 
 attend to the keeping them fresh to the extreme days of my old age, for I 
 feel that I owe much to the name of Keats being so often linked with 
 mine. It has given the public an impression which has ensured me a 
 good career, much as it was denied to him. 
 
 " Now I dare say you will think all this very vain on my part, and 
 throw cold water upon me and that ; but no, I am too old to be damped 
 by you. You may encourage me to anything, but I won't be put down. 
 Keats shall have a fine monument, and I will produce fine historical works, 
 worthy of his friend. . . ." 
 
 " 19, Brook Street, 
 
 " August 21st, 1838.f 
 
 "... .What are you doing about Keats's Life? If you have printed, 
 pray let me have it. I am stirring up here for a new edition of his and 
 Shelley's works. It is shamefully unjust that you all on the spot do not 
 pull together and catch this nice moment for Keats. Tell me the difficul- 
 ties in the way of a new and compleat edition of him. and I talk it 
 
 * Brown had by this time left Italy (1835), and had settled at Laira 
 Green, near Plymouth. 
 
 t In the summer of this year Severn made a flying visit to London. 
 
166 
 
 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 over, and determine on having beautiful engravings in it. I have got 
 very pretty ideas for it. Gibson will give us many things. I assure you 
 Keats stands so high with all the aspiring young men, particularly the 
 aristocrats, that a book would take. I'll do anything to help it on, even 
 for my own sake, as I am so proud of having been Keats's friend, seeing 
 how people are disposed to caress me for his sake. 
 
 " We are about a new project : and I, of course. It is to let the 
 
 good feeling go on, and have a group in marble by Gibson of Shelley and 
 Keats together, to be placed somewhere in London. Isn't this a beautiful 
 idea? "What a subject for sculpture! What a fine tribute to the men, 
 friends as they were, and making greater — both Greek poets, and both 
 with fine and young poet-looks. Now don't throw cold water upon it. 
 I'll raise plenty of money to do it, and Gibson made a liberal offer. That 
 stir in Parliament about Lord Byron's statue was my doing, and now 
 I'll be an agitator about Keats's. Tell me about George Keats, and also 
 about Taylor, and poor Woodhouse's papers. I knew he had the tragedy 
 copied, he told me so himself — it was from the love he bore Keats, and 
 foreseeing there might be difficulties in the way of bringing his works 
 together for a new edition." 
 
 Severn was very busy throughout 1830, partly with 
 pictures which have already been mentioned, and partly 
 with others.* Of these, among the most admired were, 
 
 * There may be given here the list of the more important copies made 
 by Severn from the pictures by the Old Masters in Borne, Florence, and 
 Venice : — 
 
 7. 
 8. 
 9. 
 
 10. 
 
 11. 
 
 12. 
 13. 
 14. 
 15. 
 
 1G. 
 17. 
 
 18, 
 19. 
 
 Doge of Genoa Vandyke 
 
 Presentation of Virgin. . . . Titian . 
 
 Pope Julius II Kaphael 
 
 Knight of Malta Giorgione 
 
 Battle of Cadore Titian . 
 
 Sketch from the original, which was burnt 
 Musicians. 
 Lady from picture of Prodigal Son Bonifaccio 
 
 Duke of Urbino Titian . 
 
 Pope Paul III., who set up the 
 
 Inquisition „ 
 
 The Father of Titian, or Dogel 
 
 Grimani / " 
 
 St. Agata Martyr P. Veronese 
 
 St. George and the Dragon . . Rubens 
 Madonna and Child .... Correggio 
 
 Angel from Guercino 
 
 Sibyl M. Angelo 
 
 Madonna (Assumption) . . . Titian . 
 
 Peter Martyr „ . 
 
 From the picture which was burnt 
 Miracle of the Hammer . . . Tintoretto . 
 Head of Saviour : an original or 
 
 old Oriental copy .... Oimabue ? . 
 
 Florence. 
 
 Venice. 
 
 Florence. 
 
 » 
 Venice. 
 
 Venice. 
 Florence. 
 
 Naples. 
 
 (AricalPal. 
 
 (Venice. 
 
 Florence. 
 
 Naples. 
 
 Home. 
 Venice. 
 
STUDY OF CENTRAL FIGUEE FOE THE "SICILIAN MARINERS' HYMN," 
 EIBST PAINTED IN 1830. 
 
 To fact page 167. 
 
BIRTH OF WALTER SEVERN. 
 
 167 
 
 ' Vintagers at Eve,' the ' Sicilian Mariner's Hymn,' ' Godfrey 
 and the Cfusaders in sight of Jerusalem,' 'Eienzi in 
 the Forum,' and ' The Falconer and Lady ' ; the first two 
 bought respectively by Sir Matthew White Eidley and the 
 Marquis of Northampton, ' Godfrey ' and ' Eienzi ' by Sir 
 Thos. Eedington, while * The Falconer ' was sent to the 
 British Institution in 1831, and sold to a Sir Charles Lamb. 
 
 But the chief event of the year, for him, was the birth 
 of his first son and second child, Walter, an event which 
 happened at Frascati on the 12th of October. 
 
 Early in 1831 it seemed as though at last the protracted 
 civil suit in which Severn had been so long and dis- 
 tractingly engaged was about to be brought to a definite 
 end. As a matter of fact the business, so discreditable to 
 all concerned, save the unfortunate person chiefly impli- 
 cated, was concluded in the early summer of this year. It 
 was now the turn of Mrs. Severn to become seriously 
 indisposed as well as her husband, whose ill-health had 
 become chronic during these trial-years, as he calls them ; 
 but fortunately Mr. Fox again happened to offer the use of 
 his villa at Frascati, and so there Mr. and Mrs. Severn, 
 with their daughter Claudia and the little Walter (upon 
 whom, by the way, his father often regretted not having 
 bestowed ' Keats ' as, at any rate, a second baptismal name 
 — as both Brown and Kirkup suggested). 
 
 At the end of the preceding December, or early in 
 January of this year, he had sent to London his picture 
 ' The Falconer,' for exhibition at the British Institution, a 
 
 20. Elizabeth and Mary 
 
 21. Confession of Saul . 
 
 22. St. John the Baptist 
 
 23. Jeremiah . 
 
 24. Head, Rubens' "Wife 
 
 25. Entombment . 
 
 26. Romulus and Remus 
 
 27. Briseis and Achilles 
 
 28. La Fornarina . 
 
 29. Sacred Subject . . 
 
 30. Landscape . 
 
 31. Crucifixion . 
 
 Albertinelli (Mari- 
 
 otto). 
 Rubens 
 
 Titian . . . 
 M. Angelo. 
 
 Spagnoletto 
 Rubens 
 
 » • 
 
 Raphael 
 Spagnoletto 
 Claude . . 
 Tintoretto . 
 
 Florence. 
 
 Venice. 
 Rome. 
 
 Naples. 
 Rome. 
 
 Naples. 
 
 Florence. 
 
 Venice. 
 
168 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 work of additional interest from the fact that the falconer 
 is a portrait of Severn himself, and the lady an exact 
 likeness of his wife. 
 
 When Severn again returned to Eome, he had not only 
 recovered from the incessant worry of the trial and his own 
 prolonged and sometimes serious indisposition, but was m 
 the best of health and the highest spirits. 
 
 " What with my Altar-Piece for Cardinal Weld," he writes, " and 
 other works on hand or in prospect, and with other matters to my great 
 content, a fortunate turn in the tide of my affairs had again come. When 
 we returned to Rome we had the most complete happiness and enjoyment 
 that it is possible for human creatures to know — prosperity, friendship, 
 the best and most entertaining society, no end of brilliant gaieties when 
 we wished them, our love for each other and our children, and above all 
 we had both by this time good health to enjoy all. Thus, despite 
 everything connected with that ugly trial, and all the anguish and 
 exhaustion for which it was directly and indirectly responsible, I have 
 never ceased to think with pleasure of this time." 
 
 If I were to edit, however concisely, from Severn's papers, 
 the account of his friendly relations with Cardinal Weld 
 and of the painting and placement of the picture he was 
 ever wont to regard as his chef d'oeuvre, it would occupy 
 more space than can be spared. The whole question of the 
 destination of this sacred picture, painted by a Protestant 
 artist for a Catholic church, excited at the time a great 
 amount of controversy and high feeling. To this day 
 it is the chief precedent when any similar difficulty 
 arises.* 
 
 This, Severn's most ambitious picture, ' The Infant of the 
 Apocalypse caught up to Heaven,' was commissioned by 
 Cardinal Weld, as a present to the Pope, and to be placed 
 as an altar-piece in the Cathedral Church of 'St. Paul 
 beyond the Walls,' and was the most fruitful result of the 
 long and unjust trial through which the English artist had 
 to maintain his stand for the right against overwhelming 
 
 * The essential part of Severn's narrative will be found in the Appendix 
 (No. II.). As Cardinal Weld had a singular influence on the fortunes of 
 Koman Catholicism in England, all Severn's remarks about him will be 
 read with interest. 
 
SEVERN'S PROSPERITY. 169 
 
 falsity and injustice. During that period and till the too 
 early death of the excellent prelate, the most friendly 
 feelings existed between Cardinal Weld and his injured 
 countryman. 
 
 During the progress of the altar-piece Severn, of course, 
 painted many other pictures, among them ' The End of a 
 .Venetian Masque ' and ' The Abdication of Mary, Queen 
 of Scots,' bought by the Earl of Eglington, and still at 
 Eglington Castle ; ' Angelica,' bought by the Duke of 
 Manchester; 'Temptation' and 'Ophelia,' bought by the 
 Duke of Devonshire, and still at Chatsworth, and other 
 equally important works. For Cardinal Weld himself he 
 painted another picture besides his great Apocalypse 
 subject : 
 
 " A small picture of the Eoman Ave Maria, with the Pantheon in the 
 background by twilight, with the full moon rising beyond, and with a 
 third light in the glow of the numerous candles with which the Madonna 
 was illumined. This small canvas, however, brought me great credit ; and 
 some years afterwards I had to paint a duplicate for the present Emperor 
 of Eussia [that is, the Czar Nicholas], who when visiting Eome, gave me 
 the order himself." 
 
 The chief account of the several episodes arising out of 
 Severn's projecting this picture, its being commissioned by 
 Cardinal Weld, and its presentation by that Prelate to the 
 Pope for the Cathedral Church of St. Paul, then being 
 restored, and the jealous ill-will and many difficulties 
 which had to be overcome before ultimate success, is given 
 in a special chapter in Severn's MS. 'Incidents of my 
 Life.' But it is not necessary to give this detailed record 
 here. Briefly, it may be said that it covers succinctly the 
 years between Severn's marriage and those of his departure 
 from Eome and return to London (1828-1841). This was, 
 in the main, a happy and prosperous time for him. Other 
 children were born, and one was lost through a tragic 
 mischance. There is not much else important to chronicle 
 beyond the visit of Sir Walter Scott to Eome, and Severn's 
 significant interview with him concerning the Keats-article 
 in ' Blackwood's ; ' this, and some correspondence. It may 
 
170 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 be added here that he did not make his often projected flying 
 -visit to England till 1838, and that over twenty years elapsed 
 between that " sad and despairing night " when he sailed from 
 Gravesend with Keats, a young and unknown artist without 
 money or definite prospects, and when he arrived [1841] 
 at Dover with his wife and family, with ample means, good 
 prospects, an assured reputation, and having among his 
 patrons an emperor, a king, a prince of the Church, and 
 several of the greatest and most influential nobles of 
 England. 
 
 To return now, briefly, to the year 1832. The quotation 
 of part of an autumn letter from Brown, from a villa near 
 Elorence, will save occupation of the reader's time with 
 unnecessary details. The allusions are to Woodhouse's 
 medallion portrait of Keats by Girometti and to Tre- 
 lawny's 'Adventures of a Younger Son,' much of which 
 had been written during the author's stay with Brown, to 
 whom, indeed, the opening portions were submitted, and 
 for most of which he chose the mottoes — the majority of 
 them from Keats's then unpublished poems, particularly 
 his and Brown's joint tragedy ' Otho.' 
 
 " .... I am wonderfully happy among my flowers, watching their 
 growth. Woodhouse lived with me here for seven weeks, and he got so 
 well in health, he was quite a credit to the place. He left me ahout a 
 fortnight since for Venice and England. I like him much, and hope he 
 will come back again. The bas-relief he gave me of our Keats delights 
 me; never was anything so like, it seems quite a piece of magic. 
 Trelawny went to England in the spring. Every one ascribes 'The 
 Younger Son' to him, but I believe he still denies it. Have you read it ? 
 I am told it runs off like wild-fire. At the head of every chapter are one 
 or two quotations from Byron, Keats, and Shelley, — from no one else ; and 
 Woodhouse and I think his lordship does not look over grand in such 
 company. Woodhouse also thinks that these quotations, in so popular a 
 book, will be of great service to the fame of Keats ; and indeed they are 
 chosen, in number fifty-three great and small, with much care, — some 
 great friend of Keats's must have done all this, don't you imagine so? 
 Woodhouse has promised to send me certain dates and other particulars, 
 which no one would ever send me, and further, has made me promise to 
 write the life of Keats in my quiet country nook during this winter. 
 Now I have changed my mind about his portrait ; it must be from that 
 medallion. What a pity it is you know nothing of flowers, — how can you 
 
LETTER FROM R. WESTMACOTT. 171 
 
 be so ignorant and live ? — otherwise I'd talk to you of my perfection of a 
 volkamoria, perfuming half my garden with its hyacinth scent, with its 
 second crop of blossoms on it at this moment; and of my noble metro- 
 sideros now in full bloom ; of my verbena splendour, in bloom for these five 
 months back, with a scarlet that would cut out all your painter's shops! " 
 
 The only letter of this year which need be quoted is one 
 from Westmacott, written from London in June. It will 
 be read with appreciation by all interested in the history of 
 English Art. 
 
 " London, 
 
 " June, 1832. 
 •" My dear Severn, 
 
 " I have been so busy and so bothered- lately that I have not had will 
 or time to write the usual bulletin on our Exhibition ; but I have had my 
 conscience quieted in some respects by finding that Eastlake has already 
 sent you an account. After his, I hardly thiuk it necessary to go into the 
 business, for he will have given you just the opinion you ought to have — 
 a painter's. The tout-ensemble is very good and highly creditable to the 
 country. Historical works of course are lacking. There are fewer 
 portraits, both in quantity and quality than usual, but in the works that 
 do tell there is, to my mind, a great deal of right stuff — very careful drawing 
 and finish, which we don't always get, and no falling off in the other 
 qualities for which the English school has been blamed and praised — colour 
 and effect. (Blamed for sacrificing too much to obtain it, and praised for 
 having hit it better than any other modern school.) Wilkie's ' Knox 
 Preaching,' ' Leslie's ' Grosvenor Family,' and ' Katherine and Petruchio,' 
 Calcott's Landscapes, ' Hilton's ' Una entering the Cottage with the Lion,' 
 and Landseer's various pictures, Collins iu two pictures, and others whom 
 I need not name here, — all contribute to prove what we have in us. Turner 
 is splendid, and excepting in one picture, ' The Burning Piery Furnace ! ', 
 charming and intelligible. His ' Italy ' is the most magnificent piece of 
 landscape poetry that was ever conceived. It is like nothing but itself, 
 so I cannot compare it with Claude or any other painter, to help your 
 notion of it. Landseer has a very fine picture called ' Hawking.' It is a 
 largish picture and almost all sky. The hawk and his prey, the sign of 
 life, are rolling down together, and have almost reached the ground — they 
 seem to live ; they are full of fury, bustle, and expression. They are 
 magnificently painted, yet still so carefully that they might be examined 
 with a magnifying-glass. The hawk has such an eye ! In the distance 
 over a bit of heath or common are seen two or three figures on whose 
 wrists are hawks ; just sufficient to explain the subject. Collins's favourite 
 picture is of some children opening a gate to a shady lane — the spectator 
 being the person riding through and into the picture ; the horse and rider 
 cast their shadow before on the foreground. The Duchess of Devonshire 
 has purchased this. Uwins has a very clever picture of a Neapolitan 
 
172 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Saint-maker's workshop. Partridge is strong in a portrait or two. 
 Phillip's I have forgotten— who is at the top of the tree this time — in 
 spite of Beechey's and Wilkie's ' Kings.' A costume picture by "Williams 
 is the delight of us all, and though I mention him last I am glad to 
 assure you that our President helps on his own and the Academy's honour ; 
 he has two or three capital pictures. Tour picture is in the ante-room, 
 on the right hand of the entrance into the Great-room, — is in good 
 company, and light. Eastlake will have told you what struck us in it. 
 With my usual candour, at which you will not be angry, I tell you 
 honestly I think it very unfinished in parts, and that is hardly compen- 
 sated for to the public by its agreeable composition, appropriate expression, 
 and warm good tone, all of which it possesses, but which artists who care 
 to look for them alone appreciate — perhaps, too, your figures are a little 
 thick or short. I do wish you would come over here, if only to see the 
 calibre of some of our chaps whom you have forgotten. To our great 
 annoyance we hear nothing of Gibson. He tells us in a letter that Lord 
 Yarborough was to have sent a work ; he has not done so. The composi- 
 tion and feeling in Wyatt's group are much admired. We here, don't 
 like your [? his] treatment of Portrait heads. Wyatt's boys and his 
 lady have not what we think should exist in that class of art. I speak 
 with deference, because I think so highly of Wyatt, and even if you tell, 
 him this I know he will take it well and without attributing any unworthy 
 feeling to my criticism. The sculpture-room is full — too full. I daresay 
 Eastlake has served us up to you, so I will run the risk of it and leave 
 ourselves out. We go on grumbling about our wretched den of a room ; 
 perhaps we may do better by-and-by, for they now talk of building the 
 National Gallery, and it is expected that an Academy of Arts may he- 
 joined with it. It is a consummation devoutly to be wished. The British 
 Gallery was kept open an unconscionable time, in the hope, I suppose, of 
 forwarding the sale of the works, but there has been no great deal done — 
 people will not spend their money this year — or they are thinking of 
 something else. I have not been to the Water-Colour Exhibition yet. 1 
 hear that it is, as usual, excellent. A new Society has not been deterred 
 by the badness of the times from starting an extra Exhibition speculation. 
 There is a new Water-Colour show in Bond Street. I have not visited it, 
 but Uwins and other clever fellows belong to it. Tour * Falconer ' still 
 sticks on hand. It has an excellent place in my house, everybody can see 
 it, and all who do, stop and admire it — but no buying ! 
 
 " Mr. Bidley Colborne, who is much looked up to, stood before it a 
 long time lately and enquired all about it — whether with any view to- 
 purchasing it I know not, but be assured I shall not lose sight of your 
 interests and wishes. We are doing German Operas with a German 
 Company on the off nights at the Italian Opera House. I think the 
 singers want ' voce? but they perform very charily, and the Chorusses are 
 excellent — time and tune perfect ; an accomplishment which the usual 
 corps of singers do not possess. ' Der Freischiitz ' and ' Fidelio ' have 
 been the two given us up to the present. They draw immense houses- 
 
BROWN MEETS MONCKTON MILNE8. 173 
 
 How are you all going on in Rome ? Gibson writes us that he likes your 
 composition for the picture ordered by the Cardinal. 1 wish you well 
 through it — it's an awful work and will want every power that you can 
 bring to bear upon it. I am delighted to hear you are pleasing yourself 
 in your progress with it. You are becoming a sad idle correspondent, but 
 I suppose a wife and children are to be the breaking up of all vagabond 
 vagaries. The better for the aforesaid vagabond, I daresay ; but the 
 survivors miss their old companions without finding any substitute, as 
 they do, for the loss. I should like to drop into the midst of you, but 
 that may not be. Will you tell Gibson I received his letter, and thank 
 him for it ? It was very gossipy and pleasant, and I wish he could bring 
 himself to send me one oftener. Pray oblige me by giving old Barbara 
 three or four dollars out of our account. I don't think I have sent her 
 a regalo for a long time. Remember me to all my old friends. 
 
 " Believe me, dear Severn, 
 " Yours truly, 
 
 " Westmacott." 
 
 " June 15. — It is not generally known yet, but Sir Walter Scott is 
 arrived — very bad — so bad indeed that his death would be hailed as a 
 blessing compared with the living on in a state of almost imbecility. 
 Shocking, is it not ? to see this wreck of mind.* Death has been busy 
 with great names lately — James Mackintosh — Butler — Jeremy Bentham 
 — Cuvier — and now Walter Scott falling! Mr. Bentham's body was 
 publicly dissected by his own desire — for the advancement of science. 
 Come va la famiglia ? Are you still playing a Crescendo movement ? 
 Gibson seems to have come to a conclusion on non-matrimony, for 
 himself! " 
 
 In Severn's single published writing of a personal nature, 
 the article on the ' Vicissitudes of Keats's Fame,' which 
 appeared in ' The Atlantic Monthly ' for 1863, there is a 
 memorable account of his meeting with Sir Walter Scott, an 
 account varied in no essential particular in another written 
 .at a later date. It is, however, not only so well known, but 
 was written in such radical misapprehension of the nature 
 of that great man, that it need not again be set forth. 
 
 I have already given an outline of Severn's life in the 
 years immediately following his marriage and before his 
 return to England, and it is unnecessary to dwell at length 
 upon details of artistic labours or to repeat the merely local 
 and transiently interesting gossip of the Rome of his day, 
 enough of which has been already given, conformably with 
 
 * Sir Walter Scott died a little over three months later. 
 
174 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 the scope of this memoir. A few personal details can best 
 be reproduced in his own words. But first I may find 
 room for one or two letters which will he of interest to some 
 readers at any rate. 
 
 Charles Brown made his visit to England alone, though 
 he did so in 1833 instead of 1832. Before he went he 
 formed an acquaintanceship at Landor's house on the hill- 
 slope below Eiesole, which, though he had no idea of any 
 particular outcome from it, was an event of singular im- 
 portance for English biographical literature, and particularly 
 for lovers of Keats. It was to this fortunate meeting,, 
 indeed, that we owe one of the most charming biographies 
 that we possess ; a book, moreover, which will preserve the 
 memory of a genial and delightful man, himself too a poet, 
 when his other writings as well as the personal tradition of 
 him shall be forgotten. 
 
 " It is now fifteen years ago," writes Lord Houghton (then E. Monckton 
 Milnes), in the Preface to the ' Life, Letters, and Literary Eemains of 
 John Keals,' " that I met at the villa of my distinguished friend Mr. 
 Landor, on the beautiful hill-side of Piesole, Mr. Charles Brown, a retired 
 Bussia-merohant, with whose name I was already familiar as the generous- 
 protector and devoted friend of the Poet Keats. . . . 
 
 " . . . . Pew of these [unpublished productions and letters of literary 
 interest] had escaped the affectionate care of Mr. Brown, and he told me 
 that he only deferred their publication till his return to England. This 
 took place two or three years afterwards, and the preliminary arrangement 
 for giving them to the world were actually in progress, when the accident 
 of attending a meeting on the subject of the colonisation of New Zealand 
 altered all Mr. Brown's plans, and determined him to transfer his fortunes 
 and the closing years of his life to the Antipodes. Before he left this 
 country he confided to my care all his collections of Keats's writings, 
 accompanied with a biographical notice, and I engaged to use them to the 
 best of my ability for the purpose of vindicating the character and 
 advancing the fame of his honoured friend." 
 
 Brown, however, returned from his first visit to England, 
 and was settled again by the autumn of 1833 at his villa 
 outside Florence, whence he wrote to Severn on the 17th of 
 September. By this time two more children had been 
 born to Severn, the elder named Arthur, and now, like his 
 elder brother Walter, a distinguished artist. 
 
LETTER FROM LEIGH HUNT. 175 
 
 In a following letter, written a few months later, there is 
 the first warning of that disastrous change in the writer's 
 fortunes as well as in his bodily health, which was the 
 indirect cause of his leaving Italy, and afterwards England, 
 for New Zealand ; for the lecture on colonization, alluded 
 to by Lord Houghton, was only the secondary, if deter- 
 mining cause of his emigration. 
 
 A letter from Leigh Hunt, introducing a friend, may be 
 given here for the sake of its fine and characteristic remark 
 about Home. 
 
 " Upper Olieyne Sow, Chelsea, 
 " Aug. 1st, 1834. 
 " My deak Severn, 
 
 " I snatch a moment, though it be but a moment, after a hard day's 
 work, that 1 may have the pleasure not only of introducing to you a young 
 artist, Mr. Dallas, a friend of my eldest son's«ind highly esteemed by him, 
 but of asking you under my own hand how you do, and pretending to 
 myself that I am standing for an instant in the thick of Rome ! I cannot 
 look even ujion this bit of paper without something like respect as well as 
 envy, to think that it will be really there, when I, the sender of it, and 
 the buman soul, cannot find a way to it. I repeat the word to myself 
 like a fine bass note — Rome — mixing it up with the murmnring of the 
 great sea of ages, and with tenderer voices of the departed, and long indeed 
 to be with you. God bless you. 
 
 " Your sincere friend, 
 
 " Leigh Hunt." 
 
 The many troubles which beset Brown in his later years, 
 the first hint of which was given in an earlier letter already 
 quoted, had their serious beginning in an apoplectic seizure 
 which overcame him one day when he was in Vieusseux's 
 Library in the Via Tornabuoni in Florence, then as now 
 the only institution of the kind in Italy of any importance. 
 
 He had always enjoyed robust health, but after this 
 attack he was more or less an invalid, though one of the 
 most dauntless and energetic sufferers among literary 
 workers since Defoe. Though in his last few years the 
 victim of epilepsy as well as apoplexy, from dyspepsia and 
 what he calls again and again a " hell of nervousness," and 
 from financial embarrassment, he actively interested himself 
 as a Librarian, as a committee member of an art institution, 
 
176 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 as a lecturer, and as an author, and ultimately even ventured 
 upon what was then a far more hazardous enterprise than 
 now, emigration to New Zealand, at that time a virgin 
 colony. His restless activity of mind and body kept him 
 busy even after his first serious attack of apoplexy. Not 
 content with gardening in addition to his usual literary 
 and artistic undertakings, he tells Severn in one of his 
 letters that he has also taken up the study of astronomy. 
 
 But his illness materially added to the home-sickness 
 which Brown had felt for some time, and this longing, 
 combined with the advisability of his going to England to 
 attend to his monetary affairs, with his son's education, and 
 with his uncertain health, determined him to break up his 
 home in Italy and return to his own country. He decided 
 to go at the end of March, and expected to arrive in good 
 time to take a house in Plymouth by Midsummer day. He 
 travelled more leisurely than he had at first intended, for he 
 did not arrive till about the end of April or early in May. 
 With characteristic enjoyment of persiflage, he assured 
 his Italian acquaintances that he was returning to England, 
 as it was necessary for him to seek a milder climate than 
 that of Italy, a remark which had point in it from the fact 
 that the winter and spring of 1835 had been, for Italy, 
 a severe one. His account of the expenses of living in 
 England about the year 1835 shows what a radical differ- 
 ence has taken place since then. A Vicar of Wakefield 
 could not nowadays exist under his famous predecessor's 
 regime ; in Brown's time he could at least have managed 
 to make both ends meet. 
 
THE KEATS-MEMORIAL. 177 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 The Keats-memorial — Brown's memoir of Keats — The " Great Plague " 
 in Eome — Severn-correspondence — Tragic death of Severn'3 child — 
 Charles Dilke and Charles Lamb — Letter from Sir Charles Eastlake — 
 Letter from George Richmond, E.A. — Letter from Charles Brown — 
 Keats's possible biographers — Last news of Charles Brown — His death 
 in New Zealand — Letter from Mr. Dilke — Keats and " fame." 
 
 Brown's next letter is from his new home, a cottage at 
 Laira Green, near Plymouth, and is the first written under 
 its roof, though he had been a tenant for some weeks. His 
 new illness, the serious one of epilepsy, did not interfere with 
 his projects of lecturing on Shakespeare's sonnets and other 
 subjects, nor his undertaking to be one of the Hanging 
 Committee at a local Art Exhibition. This little exhibition 
 is certainly the first where any prominence was given to 
 portraits of Keats. It comprised the medallion which Signor 
 Girometti made for Woodhouse, and two replicas of Severn's 
 portrait of the young poet, besides his sketch of him in 
 the hour of death. In a letter of later date Brown gives 
 further particulars, though in this communication the 
 chief interest is in what he has to say concerning George 
 Keats's legal injunction against his using any of John's 
 literary remains in his possession for his projected Memoir, 
 already in part done. He consulted Monckton Milnes on 
 this awkward point, and though at first Mr. Milnes disputed 
 George's legal power of interdict he found on enquiry that 
 such power did exist. This, for a time, caused Brown to 
 fear for his Memoir an indefinitely prolonged delay in 
 publication. 
 
 Another letter by Brown, written in this year, which 
 should be quoted, is that bearing date the 26th of November. 
 
 N 
 
178 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEIi.V. 
 
 Severn had mooted, to friends in Kome as well as to Brown 
 and others in England, yet another proposal as to the erection 
 of a monument to Keats in the Protestant Burial-G-round at 
 Eome. To this Brown was strongly opposed, and there 
 are prohably few who do not approve his attitude rather 
 than that of Severn. Not only, he writes, does he thoroughly 
 disapprove of the scheme as unnecessary and in every way 
 undesirable, but he repents of even having allowed, so far as 
 his approval was a matter of concern, anything else on the 
 tombstone but the words which Keats himself had wished to 
 be placed there. Indeed, he hopes that the Roman autho- 
 rities will permit the erasure of every word beyond those to 
 which the poet himself limited his epitaph. There is, he 
 well declares, " a sort of profanation of adding even a note 
 of admiration to [Keats's] own words." 
 
 " Laira Green, 
 
 " 26th November, 1836. 
 " When I received your last letter, nearly three months ago, I resolved not 
 to answer you in a hurry, though now, upon looking back, I am astonished 
 at so much time having passed. How could I write to disturb the pleasant 
 dreams in which you then were ? You were resolved on a fine monument to 
 Keats, and I utterly disapproved of it. If his Poems should induce 
 his countrymen, otherwise uninfluenced, to erect a monument to him, 
 my joy would be great; but I cannot approve of such an honour, 
 in a questionable shape, by his personal friends, paid to him as a poet. 
 Still, looking on the intention in its best point of view, I do not perceive 
 it can do his fame any harm, — which, at first sight, I thought I did 
 perceive. The impropriety of a relation or a friend as a subscriber to or 
 furtherer of national feeling, of a national tribute, I feel so strongly, that I 
 am afraid thousands of others will feel the same. On this ground, while I 
 sincerely thank you for referring the subject of a bas-relief and other 
 matters to me, conjointly with yourself, I must decline having anything 
 to do with the monument, — except on one point. This point is that not 
 one word shall be there except those contained in his dying request — 
 ' Here lies one whose name was writ in water,' Swayed by a veiy natural 
 feeling at the time, I advised more, but now I am convinced of the error, 
 the sort of profanation of adding even a note of admiration to his own 
 words. If a dying friend, a ^ood man, leaves strict orders for the wording 
 of his epitaph, he should be obeyed, if good faith is in the world. I have 
 long repented of my fault, and must repeat what I said to you in Eome, 
 ' I hope the government will permit the erasure of every word, with the 
 exception of those words to which he himself limited his epitaph.' The 
 
33-2. 
 
 [The child, in this group from "The Eoman Ave Maria ; " jiainted early in 1837 
 (a replica of an earlier picture), was drawn from the Severns' eldest son, Walter, 
 then some months over six, years old. The mother is a rough study from Mrs. Severn. 
 The picture was commissioned by the Czar Nicholas (then Ozaiovich), aud is now 
 in the Imperial Gallery in St. Petersburg.] 
 
 To face, page 179. 
 
BROWN'S MEMOIR OF KEATS. 179 
 
 memory of Keats has been one of my greatest pleasures, but lately it has 
 been mixed with pain, — for I have been occupied in writing my life of him, 
 and, consequently, been turning over letters and papers, some full of hope, 
 others of despair, and my mind has been compelled to trace one misfortune 
 to another, all connected with him. I knew this task was my duty, and, 
 from the beginning I had from time to time made, I found it a painful 
 one. Therefore to compel me to my duty, I boldly put down my name at 
 our Institution for a lecture, on 27th December, on ' The Life and Poems 
 of John Keats.' Now that it is advertised, the card printed, the members 
 looking forward to it, there is no retreating: it must be done. About one 
 half is done. Probably I shall afterwards print it in a Magazine, there to 
 rest as a voucher for his admirers ; possibly I may print it in a small 
 volume by itself; in either shape you must have it. My first lecture was 
 given about a fortnight ago, ' The Intellectual History of Florence.' I 
 was aware of the interest of the subject, but the unusual hand-applause 
 and the high compliments bestowed on me were unexpected. After the 
 ' Life of Keats ' I shall give no more lectures this season." . . . 
 
 The year 1837 was that known throughout Italy, and 
 nowhere with more horror of remembrance than in Borne, as 
 " the cholera year." To the Severns it was further unfor- 
 gettable as the year wherein by a tragic misadventure they 
 lost their youngest and best beloved child. Severn's own 
 record of this period of individual and general suffering and 
 horror is too lengthy and too discursive to quote here : but 
 it may be said it was a time that old Romans speak of yet 
 with shudderings. The ignorance of the people and the 
 selfish attitude of the rich, including that of the Pope and 
 his satellites, induced almost unparalleled misery ; and un- 
 fortunately, though many of the monks and humble clergy 
 strove heroically, there were among the Italians few if any 
 potent workers of the stamp of the Catholic English noble, 
 Lord Clifford. Room may, however, be found here for one 
 of Severn's reminiscences of this period. 
 
 " The cordon was drawn round nearly all the itowns, and with such 
 vigour that it was impossible to enter any of them. 
 
 " At Palestrina I slept outside the town at a miserable inn, but at last 
 I got safely to Home, saw a few alarmed friends, got together all we 
 wanted, and returned to Olevana the following day. My re-entering the 
 town was agreed on before I left, provided the cholera was not officially 
 declared at Rome. Very soon after, in the month of June, the cholera 
 broke out at Rome with unlooked-for fury. 
 
 N 2 
 
180 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEHN. 
 
 " There had been heavy rains during two days, when the damp chill 
 produced double effect on the people, owing to the superstitious ceremony 
 in vogue in time of the plague, of going at night barefoot to pray to a 
 certain Madonna, a ceremony on this occasion attended by upwards ot 
 ten thousand people. The result was that the next day about three 
 hundred persons died! What made their death and cholera more 
 dreadful was that the victims were almost all young and hale persons. 
 Death had proudly and scornfully refused the old and infirm. How, when 
 I heard this terrible news, did I reflect on the arrogance of the Eoman 
 people in assuming that the cholera would not dare to enter Borne on 
 account of the holiness of the place, and how the Eoman pride was at 
 last struck down by the fact that the number of the deaths was greater 
 than in any other place, and with the victims all young and hale people. 
 It was to us like living anew the period of the plague as described in 
 Boccaccio's ' Decameron,' shut up as we are in the Apennine town, 
 where no cholera ever approached, and where we received every kind of 
 hospitality, and that almost daily, and where the scenery was of the 
 most romantic nature and the people, in addition to being finely made 
 and handsome, were so amiable and good and indulgent to all our wants. 
 After a short time our money became exhausted, and as I had just made 
 a, loan to Chevalier Bunsen for his hospital on the Capitol, and as I could 
 not get at the banker in Eome, nor at Bunsen, who was also shut up by 
 the Prascati cordon, our case would have been very deplorable bad not 
 these people been of the best kind of Italians. But with all their great 
 hospitality and fondness for. the few strangers visiting them, and their 
 generosity as far as their means went, they had little or no money 
 amongst them. Yet they lent sacks of corn, bags of salt, baskets of 
 potatoes, and so on, and in this way we paid for what we had and got on 
 most pleasantly. But, oh ! the contrast of our most charming and quiet, 
 healthy and beautiful retreat, when we received the fumigated letters 
 from Eome giving us frightful accounts of the deaths of friends and 
 acquaintances of all ranks, and even in our own house, for the old General 
 Braci died, and our English friend Barlowe the sculptor, and under very 
 painful circumstances. Then we heard of a state of almost public 
 anarchy. Contagion being the order of the day, all the nobles, and even 
 the Pope himself, had biicked up their palaces, and selfishly left the rest of 
 the city to destruction from plunder and murder ; anarchy indeed, had it 
 not been that the cholera arrested the one and the other by its impartial 
 and severest judgments. 
 
 " It was an astounding fact that a body of assassins, some hundred and 
 twenty in number, had planned to sack the city and murder all the 
 wealthy inhabitants. The police had got [information of ?] all their men, 
 but were unable through fear to arrest any of them. The cholera lasted 
 three months. At the end of that time, when the police began to gain 
 power and confidence and were at last able to arrest these assassins, out 
 of the six score they found only six alive. Such justice had the plague 
 wrought ! Yet in the midst of all this horror were episodes of such 
 
THE " GBEAT PLAGUE" IN ROME. 181 
 
 beauty and loveliness that it seemed almost' impossible at such a time 
 there could be any more enduring. Among other things, I heard con- 
 tinually of the doings of Lord Clifford who, at the moment of the most 
 frightful public perversion on the subject of contagion, and when the plague 
 was devastating the city without there being any practical public effort 
 to save it, pursued a calm and even tranquil career in medically attending 
 some fifty to a hundred people a day. By his fearlessness and reasonable 
 procedure he must have done great good, and helped to clear away the 
 prejudice about apathy to contagion. When the disease was nearly over, 
 he generously opened the English College as a convalescent hospital. 
 He surprised me by his statement that more persons died from the sudden 
 return of life during artificial restoration than of those who died from the 
 malady. This, latterly, he obviated by giving patients from twenty to 
 twenty-five grains of aconite, which so retarded the return of life that it 
 saved the attack on the brain, but of course it involved a much longer 
 convalescence. 
 
 " There were acts of Lord Clifford that, unless they were in harmony 
 with his whole career in Borne at this time, would appear as the acts 
 of a heroic madman. For instance, there was in Bome, at this period a 
 very old English Boman Catholic lady with her two daughters, Devon- 
 shire people and old friends of Lord Clifford. This old lady was taken 
 ill, and died at the age of 84, but not of cholera. The cart which went 
 round daily for all the dead took the body of the old lady, to the great 
 grief and horror of the two daughters, as thus their- dear old mother 
 would not have individual burial or even the service of the church. 
 The burial-place outside the walls, at the Church of San Lorenzo, was 
 made by forming immense long fosses into which, without any service 
 of the church, were thrown each evening all the dead of that day, and 
 this, at the worst time, took from sunset to sunrise. Lord Clifford was 
 accustomed to visit these ladies every evening, and, on that following 
 the day of the old lady's death, he was dismayed to find her dead, and 
 her body taken to San Lorenzo. He soon found a consolation for the 
 daughters by assuring them that he would in the morning get an order 
 from the Governor of Borne to disinter the body, and that he would 
 then cause to be performed all the funeral offices of the church. All 
 this he accomplished. He assured me that the sight after sunset at 
 San Lorenzo was the most awful that could be imagined. Carts were 
 arriving continually, filled with naked dead bodies, which were at once 
 on their arrival thrown into the fosse. These death-carts came in 
 unbroken procession from sunset until two and three o'clock in the 
 morning.. There were innumerable torches to light up the dismal.work. 
 During a month, this rude interment was at the rate of 300 corpses 
 a day. Of course, to return to my anecdote, the men were unable to 
 attend to Lord Clifford's request to disinter the body of his old friend until 
 they had buried all of that day. About dawn they commenced digging 
 into the trench of the day before, and after the work of a whole hour 
 they found the old lady's body, and got it up and placed it in the coffin 
 
182 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 on the Her his Lordship, with all the San Lorenzo priests, had prepared. 
 The body was taken to the church, and the service for the dead chanted, 
 and then he saw it quietly placed in the tomb which had been hastily 
 prepared for it. 
 
 " This being done, he returned at seven o'clock to breakfast with 
 the two ladies, and consoled them with the news that their mother's 
 body was placed in a Christian tomb. There was no funeral ceremony 
 whatever over those dead of cholera, and of course at such a time there 
 was no chance of distinction, as death levelled all. The details were 
 awful ; for instance, people threw the dead bodies out of the windows into 
 the streets to save perilous handling of contagion, and I was informed 
 that it was an appalling thing to see the continued falling of the corpses. 
 
 " The one extraordinary fact of all was that of the numerous men employed 
 to receive and convey the dead bodies to San Lorenzo, not one died of 
 cholera ! Yet they' were guilty of acts of levity and even atrociousness 
 that cannot be believed. The population of Borne was reduced by 
 15,000, and these mostly young people. When I went back to Borne 
 for a day in the month of October it amazed me to see all the poor old 
 miserable beggars and invalids with whose appearance I was familiar 
 still there. At that time I was occupied on a difficult pictorial subject : 
 'Godfrey and his Army in sight of Jerusalem;' for the background of 
 which I had set my mind on a scene with olives at Tivoli. This place 
 had been one of the worst visited by the cholera, notwithstanding that 
 a cordon had been drawn the whole time. To accomplish this study at 
 Tivoli, I had to cross the mountains with a guide, and make a retrograde 
 movement. On arriving at dawn, I soon found what I wanted to paint, 
 and having had my breakfast, and all being ready, I sat down and 
 began. I had painted for about an hour, when I heard the sound of 
 drums and trumpets and bands of music, and soon saw a procession 
 advancing from the town, which slowly came to where I was painting. 
 In this spot there was a little open chapel, and I was agreeably surprised 
 to find that the whole procession stopped, while all knelt on the very 
 spot I had chosen for my background ; so that I had the singular 
 gratification of seeing just the real effect of figures and landscape 
 which I was trying to paint. The dresses were very rich, there 
 was even armour, with many banners, and moreover a cardinal in his 
 scarlet robes. When I got to Eome and was able to go on with my 
 picture I changed all the composition to the effect of what I saw at 
 Tivoli, and so this picture of mine of ' Godfrey and his Army in sight of 
 Jerusalem' was really a record of this incident. I got back to my family 
 again at Olevano the following day, having travelled all night with a 
 guide over the mountains. To walk in, I wore a white jacket over a 
 flannel one during the cool of the night. 
 
 " It was with some regret that we left this most lovely sojourn. The 
 romantic beauty of the scenery had grown upon us during our stay, and 
 there being no cholera and no illness we were as it were in a Paradise, 
 and had the happiness to see our children thrive in the Apennine air. 
 
SEVERN-CORRESPONDENCE. 183 
 
 I was also able to paint four small pictures, -which produced me £100; 
 two of these are now in Eglinton Castle, and another was bought by 
 Lord Northampton (' Isabella and the Pot of Basil'). 
 
 " We returned two years later in tho month of November, and then I 
 painted the Fountain picture, now in the possession of Lord Lansdowne. 
 The kind people had kept the grapes on the vine for me, and during 
 three days' heavy rain I sat and painted this pergola, knowing that my 
 ■constitution would pay for it. I went on painting all the figures of 
 this picture until Christinas, always drooping and drooping a little 
 more, and on my return to Rome, before I had finished my picture, I 
 had an attack of rheumatic fever, and for two months was scarce able to 
 turn over in my bed." 
 
 Of course during all the visitation of cholera to Kome, 
 Brown was naturally most anxious on account of his friends, 
 and particularly for the Severns. But the chief reason for 
 inserting the following letter is its interesting information 
 concerning his difficulties with the Keats Memoir, and his 
 idea of leaving the MS. with the authorities of the British 
 Museum for ultimate publication. The letter also contains 
 news of his improved health ; of his forthcoming lectures ; 
 of his theory as to the amount of Shakespeare's means, and 
 of Shakespeare having been in Italy in 1597 ; and his 
 opinion as to the dominant quality of the great dramatist's 
 genius. Though in it he writes upon subjects already 
 alluded to, room may be found immediately afterward for 
 Severn's letter written on his return to Borne, after the 
 cholera had left: particularly as few letters of his, from 
 1835 to 1860, seem to have been preserved. Thereafter 
 follow two letters from Brown, which hardly require com- 
 ment. Mr. C. W. Dilke, heartily disliked by others than 
 Brown, does not appear in a pleasant light in either. I 
 think that Charles Lamb's epithet for " a particular kind 
 of blockhead " is new to us. It is pleasant to learn that 
 Haslam, who, some time after Keats's death, was far from 
 prosperous, seems to have been so in his later years. 
 It appears from what Brown says of Dilke' s communication 
 with him, that the chief . difficulty with George Keats, 
 in the matter of the injunction against Brown, was a 
 money one. Once he was satisfied on this point, there was 
 
184 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 to be no more opposition from George. . In connection with, 
 this letter the reader should turn to Dilke's letter of 1841, 
 quoted later. Brown, however, was unwilling to diverge 
 from what he elsewhere called the straight line of his duty 
 to Keats's, memory, and wished to be responsible for nothing 
 unless it were likely to be properly as well as loyally and 
 pleasantly done. 
 
 " Laira Green, near Plymouth, 
 
 '-'26th October, 1837. 
 " My deae Severn, 
 
 " It is now ten months since I wrote to you, and all this time I have 
 had no news of you or yours. My faculty of hope is tolerably strong ; 
 but when I found the cholera had ceased in Eome, and still you did not 
 write, I became uneasy, till last night I tossed about in bed in downright 
 fear. Pray write immediately. Keats's ' Life ' remains unpublished till 
 called for; I am sorry to say there is no call for it at present, so it may 
 remain quiet till I am ' quietly inurned.' I have done what I conceived 
 my duty, and I can leave it to another generation, if, after my death, he 
 should be then more considered by the many. I cannot bear the thought 
 of its being printed and received as of little interest except among a few. 
 Sometimes, however, I think of printing a limited number, and of not 
 selling one: and sometimes my purpose is to lodge it in the British 
 Museum, to be referred to at any time, by anybody. It is, of course, 
 short, as I am not permitted to use for publication his posthumous 
 poems. . . . Last Thursday I gave one lecture on Shakespeare, and to- 
 night I am to give another. In that one already given I brought forward 
 very strong circumstantial evidence from his works that he must neces- 
 sarily have visited Italy, about 1597, I having first proved that he had 
 sufficient means, wilh prudence, to meet the expense of such a journey. 
 By the bye, from some late discoveries, irrefragable ones, I can calculate 
 that, at the age of forty-four, he was possessed in lands and money, of 
 £6500 in our present money, or £1300 of his time. I was listened to with 
 deep interest ; but neither that, nor the question of his learning in the 
 classics, could raise a general discussion. Every man would have it 
 understood he knows a great deal about Shakespeare, but if he is led into 
 deep water, he is silent." . . . 
 
 " Rome, 
 
 " November 21st, 1837. 
 " My deae Brown, 
 
 " You surprise me greatly in the fact of ten months having passed away 
 without a letter from me. Except that I had nothing very good or agree- 
 able to tell, I know not what to say. Your letter is delightful, as it brings 
 all good tidings, when I am glad to grasp at anything cheerful. Your 
 having embraced a life and habit so congenial to your health and character 
 is, very gratifying to me. Really you give me such a lively picture; of 
 your lecturing that I can almost hear you and fancy myself in a good 
 
TRAGIC DEATH OF SEVERN'S CHILD. 185 
 
 place, considering what a full assembly you have got. Does the Institu- 
 tion ever publish ? if so, I may hope to have the pleasure of reading some 
 of yours. We have during the cholera been in a beautiful retreat at 
 Olevano, forty miles from Borne, where we have passed the time as happily 
 as it was possible for people bringing with them a load of grief. You have 
 not heard of our horrible misfortune, and were you only a man of feeling, 
 I would not oppress you with it ; but as you are also a useful member of 
 society, I feel it my duty to relate the whole sad tale. My youngest boy, 
 a beautiful and lively infant nearly a year old, was cut off by a most 
 calamitous death. I confess that he was our loving pride. He had never 
 had a moment's sickness ; his vivacity was such that he played with every- 
 body, and was known everywhere. I mention these things as they helped 
 to make our loss still greater. His mother had just put him to bed in the 
 daytime, and in the next room was relating the pretty way in which he 
 had gone to sleep, for everything he did was spoken of. She was absent 
 some few minutes, when on returning to the room she found him hanging 
 dead from the bed. We had instant aid, but to no purpose. It is sup- 
 posed he got his dear little feet under the rail of his bed whilst he slept, 
 and by passing down the bed on one side by degrees he slipt quite down 
 to his head, and then the rail, made to prevent him, caught the back of 
 his neck and was the cause of his death ; and so my poor wife found him. 
 He seemed still asleep, and the surgeon supposed that he must have died 
 sleeping. You can imagine the state this threw us into ; indeed, on my 
 return to Eome after a week's absence, I found all our part still in tears 
 for our lovely boy. We had arranged to go to the mountains a week 
 before, and the carriage came by appointment two days after this frightful 
 accident. I thought it a providence to save us all; we had forgotten all 
 about the journey ; the cholera had begun, and our danger would have 
 been great. In Olevano we stayed till the middle of November, and now 
 ■we are returned to our house, which within presents every painful remem- 
 brance of our dear angel, and without doors reminds us of friends snatched 
 off by the cholera. You will easily imagine how pleasant your letter must 
 have been. Our return to Eome seems after an absence of twenty years 
 instead of a few months, — for the number of deaths, some fifteen thousand, 
 the pallid countenances all seemingly sunk in years, the vacant streets and 
 the gloom, it all seems as though after an absence of years. I have been 
 also unfortunate in the sale of my pictures, having by me some thousand 
 pounds' worth ; this is from the persons who ordered them not being able 
 to pay me. My last commission I am now at work on, ' The Crusaders 
 in sight of Jerusalem.' The future may turn up some good fortune. I 
 have done many small works in the country which are saleable. Thank 
 God, I am in good health, and also my family. I shall strive hard, but 
 have great enemies, as I believe there is no one who has had commissions 
 in painting of historical subjects but myself. 1 have numerous friends who 
 are, I think, good and useful. Farewell, my dear Brown. Believe me ever 
 
 " Sincerely yours, 
 
 " J. Severn." 
 
186 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 " London, 
 
 " 2nd June, 1838. 
 " My dear Severn, 
 
 " Here am I, lured from my quiet cottage to the turmoil of a city, for 
 the sake of publishing a volume, which may, in its consequences, bring 
 -disquiet into my cottage. One good thing, however, has accrued : — I have 
 seen your four pictures in the Exhibition. My praise is worth nothing, 
 as I am an interested party ; but they are much praised by those who 
 know nothing about you. They are well placed. Your ' Crusaders ' 
 seems to be the chief favourite ; though I prefer the Venetian scene. The 
 composition of the former is most striking. Imagination, which we rarely 
 see now-a-days in painting, is in your paintiog; not a dreamy one, like 
 Fuseli's, but one that makes your treatment of a subject gain imperceptibly 
 on the beholder. The colour fully keeps its purpose with any of the best 
 around them. "Wilkie must be merely painting for money, — his are sad 
 fallings off. Turner is like a kitchen-fire in the dog-days. Going from 
 the Exhibition to the National Gallery, I became intoxicated with 
 admiration; and I endeavoured to account for part of their — the old 
 masters' — superiority. Beyond any modern they contrived to give a 
 roundness to the figures ; somehow, it seems as if, by turning the frame, 
 we could see the other side of the limbs. How this is managed I know 
 not, but occasionally I perceive they adopted a bold, harsh outline, which, 
 I thought, contributed to the magical effect. This, together with the 
 depth they gave to their pictures, seems to me the grand- secret : reflect 
 on how it might be done. . . . Dilke is altogether unpleasant towards 
 myself. He is dogmatical, conceited, and rude. Success has turned his 
 brains. For the last fortnight I have kept from his house, except in 
 paying two visits of mere civility ; and though I will not again quarrel 
 with him, I would rather not henceforth be in his company : it is a nuisance 
 to my better thoughts. My forthcoming volume is on Shakespeare. It 
 is printed at my own risk. I say nothing of its contents, as I shall send 
 you a copy by Mr. Crawford, who will set off for Florence in about two 
 months. Charles Eichards prints it. 1 have dined with Haslam, who 
 lives like a most prosperous man. He has a wife and daughter, the latter 
 a nice girl of about sixteen ; he sends remembrances, and no reproaches 
 for not writing. In this town, this city of humbug, I am hurried and 
 flurried in all sorts of ways. I am sick of the eternal wheels, sick of the 
 eternal streets, and abominably sick of the process of printing. Away I 
 go to-morrow, leaving the last proofs to the care of the printer." 
 
 " Laira Green, 
 
 "23rd August, 1838. 
 " My dear Severn, 
 
 " You puzzle me with your unadvised comings, your threatened goings, 
 and your unthought of stayings. I enter heart and hand into all your 
 good purposes about Keats. You do me injustice in thinking I am remiss 
 
CHARLES DILKE AND CHARLES LAMB. 187 
 
 -or lukewarm. His memoir has been long ready, and I am anxious it 
 should be published. Here are the difficulties in publishing the whole of 
 his poems. Moxon told me that Taylor, like a dog in a manger, will 
 neither give a second edition, nor allow another to give one. But now, I 
 believe, his copyright is out. George Keats threatened anyone with an 
 injunction who should publish the posthumous poems ; this indeed stopped 
 me in the intended publication of the Memoir. Dilke, George's agent, 
 however, told me, when I was in town, that George wished to obtain from 
 me those posthumous poems, by purchase, if they could not be otherwise 
 obtained. My reply was most conciliatory on this point, puttiug all 
 thoughts of profit aside. I desired to publish a few here. Dilke told me he 
 knew of no objection now to my publishing the whole. Thus it stands. 
 A publisher, whoever he may be, would desire explicit allowance, lest he 
 might subject himself to an injunction; and he, a stranger, would be the 
 fittest party to apply to Dilke and, if necessary, to Taylor. I know not 
 where Woodhouse's papers are, but I have everything, from which a 
 proper selection should be made, as some poems are trivial, or some parts 
 are, and some were written when he was unskilled. The former difficulties 
 may now be easily overcome, and I hope soon to hear from you that a 
 respectable publisher is taking it in hand. Perhaps mine, Bohn in Kiug 
 William Street, will be glad to enter on it. When in town I doubted the 
 behaviour of Dilke, as he is subject to violent fits of ill-temper. I doubt 
 nothing now. It was all malice prepense. My fault has been in not 
 lauding his literary talents, which was out of my power. I could praise 
 his talents in obtaining success, but no more. My conscience has undone 
 me with him. Two days since I wrote him a declaration of war, *because 
 I would not be treacherous like himself; and I told him plainly he was 
 generally regarded as a blockhead, quoting Charles Lamb's adjective — for 
 a particular sort of blockhead — a Dilkish blockhead. Thus, during the , 
 winter I can, without remorse, draw him at full length in a novel. He 
 is a capital character for one. Because I rarely show my teeth, he thought 
 1 was unable to bite. Mind you come here on your way to Paris. You 
 -can go every mile of the way by steam. Give me warning of your 
 approach, lest I should be flitting on some little excursion. I wrote to you 
 at Borne a kind message from Haslam. You have seen him of course. 
 Thomas Bichards, the eldest son of our old friend, wrote to you at the 
 Academy in order to learn your address for me. He writes he has neither 
 seen you, nor heard from you. 
 
 " Yours most sincerely, 
 
 "Chas. Beown." 
 
 The last quoted letter was addressed to its recipient at 
 .a house in Brook Street in London. Severn had thought 
 it best, apart from his wish to see his people again, to go to 
 London before arrival there with his family for good. His 
 ^stay was a brief one, however, nor did he spend any time of 
 
188 LIFE OF JOSEPH. SEVERN. 
 
 it in the house of his parents : indeed, he seems to have 
 encountered few even of his old friends. In August he left 
 England again for Italy, and up to the beginning of 1840 
 remained uncertain as to the date of the family's migration 
 from Eome. 
 
 A chatty Art-letter from Eastlake, which he received in 
 June 1839, will be read with interest. ' The Ancient 
 Mariner ' alluded to in it is one of Severn's best as well as 
 most imaginatively conceived pictures. It is now in the 
 possession of Lord Coleridge, to whom it was presented by 
 its previous owner, the late Mr. Walter Halliday. 
 
 " 13, Upper Fitzroy Street, London, 
 "June 12th, 1839. 
 " My deak Severn, 
 
 " I have to thank you for your letter and the kind promise to send 
 me some engravings. Hewitt has not yet made his appearance. 
 
 " 1 fully expected to see you here or I should have written to you some 
 time ago. What was then in my mind, however, is now like an old or 
 forgotten story, and I turn to matters of more immediate interest. I am 
 glad to hear that you are going on with your altar-piece. 
 
 " Am I to understand that this is the work for the Emperor of Russia ? 
 Perhaps 'his is a distinct work, if so, 'tanto meglio,' as your practice in 
 history will be the greater. 
 
 " Thank you for your news about Cammuccini, &c. I suspect your 
 impression of the Munich works is quite just, but fresco is always a little 
 more removed from nature than oils — not, however, so far as to excuse a 
 total absence of good colour, which you seem to think is the case with the 
 Munich artists. 
 
 " In asking me to give an. account of the Exhibition you ask me to do 
 what might be barely possible in the first moments of surprise, and if 
 then done might afterwards be regretted. I never feel inclined to say 
 anything of the works exhibited ; a just and discriminating criticism is a 
 very difficult and should be a long considered undertaking, and as to 
 private opinion, it is not only the opinion of a particular person but of 
 that person at a particular time. What therefore is it good for ? You 
 have generally applied to Uwins for a critique on the Exhibition, and if I 
 do not regret that you have not done so now it is only because he could 
 not say so distinctly as I can, that he himself has succeeded in this year's 
 Exhibition in a very, remarkable manner. Since his election into the 
 Academy he had (as is often the case) been attacked very violently ([ 
 learn from himself) in the papers, and hence it was an object with him to 
 muster as strong and as well as he could in this Exhibition. 
 
 " He sent eight pictures, but reserved one to make room for othera. 
 
LETTER FROM SIR CHARLES EASTLAEE. 189 
 
 The seven exhibited were disposed of, but he has had numerous applica- 
 tions for them all. The tide of public favour has in short turned effec- 
 tually towards him, and his position has never been so prosperous or 
 promising as it now is. This news at least will bd gratifying to you. Of 
 the other Exhibitors I should mention Maolise, and say he is as great as 
 ever, but as we differed, about his talent last year it will be useless to 
 describe and extol what you can imagine and might condemn. Land seer 
 is also I think as great as ever, but because he is not more great than ever 
 the public is beginning to be fastidious. 
 
 " The impression you made last year has made people ready to carp at 
 you too. Had you not exhibited your ' Ancient Mariner,' which is greatly 
 admired, you would hardly have held your own, for the ' Rienzi ' is not so 
 great a favourite. 
 
 " Tell Gibson his ' Venus ' is very much admired indeed. His other 
 works and Wyatt's figure may be as much praised, but I have heard most 
 of the ' Venus.' There is a marble statue by the daughter of a sculptor 
 which has great merit — but I forget, all this and more will be better told 
 by Theed, who shortly returns to Rome. I am writing in some haste for I 
 am going out of town, indeed out of England, for a fortnight. Do not, 
 however, think this is an excuse for not saying more of the Exhibition. 
 I could not now say more if I had a whole day to write. I believe I before 
 mentioned, in a former letter to Rome, that some comparatively new men 
 have greatly distinguished themselves, viz. : — Redgrave, Cooper, and 
 others, but these two especially. The arrangers, of whom Uwins was one, 
 did themselves credit by placing the works of these contributors in good 
 places, and they (1^ie latter) are all in a fair way in consequence, but their 
 merit deserved every consideration. 
 
 " Your ' Rienzi ' is hung where your ' Godfrey ' was last year, the 
 ' Ancient Mariner' a little to the left and rather lower. Wishing you all 
 success, and with best remembrance to all, I am dear Severn, 
 
 " Yours very truly, 
 
 " 0. L. Eastlake." 
 
 In the following July Severn received a letter from 
 another artist correspondent, one of the chief friends of his 
 later life, George Bichmond, K.A. It is an account of that 
 distinguished artist's impressions when he first went to 
 Venice. The reader may be interested to turn from this 
 letter to one {vide p. 205) written by Mr. Euskin on the 
 occasion of one of his early visits to the beautiful city. 
 
 " Venice, 
 
 "July 24th, 1839. 
 " My deab Sevebk, 
 
 " I promised you a leiter, so here goes, but you must not expect 
 a fine critique on Venetian Art, ravings about their glazing, or any 
 
190 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 wonderful discoveries about grey grounds ; for I am sorry to say I have- 
 made none, but have looked when I have not been at work (which has been 
 seldom), with much such eyes as others I expect bring, quite willing to be 
 pleased, and therefore have not been disappointed. Here nature has 
 triumphed over art, or rather nature and art have combined in the evening: 
 of every fine day to beat everything that ever was or will be for splendour 
 and gorgeousness of effect in the view from the water at sunset of 
 St. Mark's, and all the rich accompaniments about it. I pay you an 
 honest compliment in saying it has often reminded me of the beautiful 
 sketch you made of this as a background to your picture of Venice. Well 
 I must say I have not been so surprised as I expected by the works I have- 
 . yet seen, for the Palz° St. Marco I have not yet visited. In Home I was 
 thunderstruck at the first view of its treasures : in Venice, I have been less 
 astonished than delighted, and I find its treasures grow on me daily. Onfr 
 thing is to he said in explanation of this, that out of Rome one can hardly 
 know Eaffaello or Michael Angelo at all, but out of Venice one may be 
 perfectly acquainted with Titian and Paolo Veronese. Tintoretto is the- 
 man whom one sees for the first time here, and truly l^have been astounded 
 by the magnificence and daring character of his works, both in design and 
 colour. He puts me often in mind of Rembrandt, but he is immensely 
 stronger in invention, indeed some of the works in the Scuola of San 
 Rocco rank him with the great designers of the Roman and Florentine 
 schools. What a group of women that is, ini the great picture of the 
 Crucifixion, at the foot of the Cross. I very much doubt if Volterra's so 
 much celebrated one in S. Trinita dei Monti surpasses it. Art seems but a 
 plaything in his hands, and this over-boldness has often betrayed him into 
 errors, not to say signal failures for such a man. 
 
 " The 'Assumption' of Titian's is a surprising picture, full of greatness of 
 intention and in the execution, but the figures strike me as no more or less 
 than picturesque books, excepting the children and angels, some of which 
 equal anything I have seen. But the picture of pictures, to my taste, is 
 the large Paolo Veronese, which for vivacity and freeness of execution 
 united to a most enchanting tone over the whole, is one of the wonders of 
 art. I don't think anything can be fiuer or more simply painted. It 
 strikes me as a far more agreeable whole than the large picture in the- 
 Louvre. I have just begun a copy of two figures the size of the original:'. 
 They stand before a pillar something such [sketch follows], and I think 
 for intensity of character nothing I ever saw surpasses them. The great 
 fat fellow with the hanging-looking moor beside him is worthy of Michael 
 Angelo. Do you not think for style that Paolo is even better to study 
 than Titian ? By-the-bye what curious works the latter ones of Titian, 
 [ ? ] put me something in mind of old Northcote's painting. They look so 
 muddled and pottered over, just what one would look for as the result of 
 extreme old age. A work they show of his early youth gives promise of 
 all that followed. To have been in order, I should have told you that we 
 stayed a whole day at Bologna, so that I had at least one hearty good look 
 at the Gallery there, which surprised me by its riches ; although small, it 
 
LETTER FROM GEORGE RICHMOND, R.A. 191 
 
 is very perfect. All the pictures are good, and many of them are first-rate 
 specimens of the masters. What a sober, subdued, and grand tone 
 pervades the works of their school. I certainly think they went very far 
 towards achieving their object of uniting to the tone and colour of Venice 
 the gusto in design of Eome and Florence. I made a number of little 
 sketches while I stayed, just taking the plan of some of the finest works, 
 and I shall do this now wherever I go. Since I came here I have made 
 ten water-colours of the best pictures in the Belle Arti, which I think will 
 be of use to me. I am sure you are right in recommending a sketch 
 whenever it may be got, for it remains, while mere impressions are fugitive 
 as the day. What rascally cheats these Venetians are, and yet very good 
 people in their way, wonderfully civil, and at the Galleries (oh ! what a 
 contrast to Eome) they are perfection. One has but to apply and 
 entrance to study is obtained instantly. Pray give my love to the illus- 
 trissimo blackguard Agricola when you see him. I speak of his maldirec- 
 tion wherever I can, for such a man ought to be removed from his post." 
 
 A long period of silence intervened in Severn's and 
 Brown's regular correspondence, which was at length broken 
 by a letter from Brown, the last but two which Severn was 
 to receive from him, one announcing his departure for New 
 Zealand and the reasons for that adventurous step, and the 
 other (written shortly before his death) from the settlement 
 of Taranaki. The letter is dated from Chichester, near 
 which town Brown had gone to see his son, there in training 
 for his intended career as a civil engineer. Despite his 
 broken health, he is as indefatigable as ever, and writes 
 that in addition to his literary vocation and many avoca- 
 tions he is engaged to contribute weekly a political article 
 to a Liberal Plymouth paper. 
 
 In the spring of 1841 a letter was received from George 
 Keats, waiving his legal rights, and agreeing to the publi- 
 cation of a ' Memoir, and Literary Remains ' of his brother 
 John. But shortly before this, Brown happened to take 
 great interest in the new El Dorado for the colonist, New 
 Zealand. In a letter to Trelawny he mentioned that if he 
 were a younger man he would certainly embark for the new 
 country : and in another to Kirkup he referred to Carlino's 
 future, and said (alluding to New Zealand) " that way 
 fortune lies." Still, all this was merely in the air. One 
 day, however, he went to Plymouth to hear a lecture on the 
 
192 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 subject of the colonization of New Zealand. The result was 
 that he was convinced, charmed, irresistibly attracted by 
 the idea of emigration. With all his prudence and scrupu- 
 lous heed of common sense, he was, more Scotico, impulsive 
 and enthusiastic. Before he reached home that day he had 
 practically made up his mind to emigrate, despite the 
 uncertainties thus opened before him, his time of life and 
 very indifferent health, and Carlino's interrupted studies 
 and dubious prospects. Further reflection confirmed his 
 first intention. With characteristic promptitude he made 
 at once all necessary arrangements, even to his outfit and 
 the engaging of two berths in a ship due to sail towards the 
 end of May. 
 
 The cottage at Laira Green, where, and amid his flowers, 
 he had hoped to live quietly for the remainder of his days, 
 unless Carlino's prospects should make it advisable for him 
 to live elsewhere, was sold. Carlino had already left his 
 manual work at Midhurst, and the two spent a brief time in 
 London, visiting Leigh Hunt and other friends. Brown's 
 chief regret was in leaving his long projected ' Memoir and 
 Literary Kemains of John Keats,' unfinished and unpub- 
 lished. It had been his great hope, particularly latterly, to 
 be the biographer of his beloved friend : and this not so 
 much from eagerness to be associated with the illustrious 
 poet as from a loyal regard for his memory and genius, and 
 a fear lest the work should inadequately be undertaken by 
 some one else. He had, however, great confidence in 
 Bichard Monckton Milnes, and decided that he could not do 
 better than leave his MSS. with him. Mr. Milnes was 
 himself a man of letters, and though unfortunately he had 
 never seen Keats, he was a fervent admirer both of the man 
 and the poet. In two letters to Severn, addressed to him 
 after his arrival in England, in which he alludes again to his 
 decision to emigrate, and sets forth his reasons, he also 
 relates his reasons for entrusting the Keats 'Memoir' to 
 Monckton Milnes, and those for his objection to its being 
 handed over to one or two other friends and acquaintances. 
 
 The second is torn : the first is as follows : — 
 
LETTER FROM CHARLES BROWN. 193 
 
 " Laira Green, 
 
 " 21st March, 1841. 
 " My deak Severn, 
 
 " Welcome to England ! An impudent congratulation, you will say, 
 from one about to go to the other hemisphere at the beginning of May. 
 I knew you were coming, knew it from others, though I have been 
 strangely kept in the dark by yourself. How could I well reply to your 
 letter of September? Scarcely was it received, when I was cogitating 
 on New Zealand ; and when I had made up my mind, and was about to tell 
 you the news, I heard you were expected in England. Did I not tell you 
 that your Coronation visit might come to this ? I am certain you have 
 done right, not only for your wife's health, and your boy's education, but 
 for your profession. You press me, with your wonted kindness, to go and 
 live with you, instead of pursuing my plans. You tempt me, but I 
 cannot, must not. Had I thought of such a course, while making up my 
 mind to be or not to be an emigrant, I might have concluded otherwise — 
 certainly I should have paused. As it is, the die is cast. Yesterday 
 I took leave of Carlino, who precedes me — he is at present wind-bound in 
 the harbour. Though chiefly for his benefit, it is fair to state that our 
 going was by no means at his suggestion, for he was, at first, very averse 
 ■to it. Of course I have weighed the consequences of this step with all the 
 •ability in my power, and I ought to have the credit of proper deliberation. 
 You blame me; but are you acquainted with the country by the best 
 report, with the probable great advantages (not so much, perhaps, in 
 money getting at my time of life, but in happiness), and with the scheme 
 in detail or generally ? I think you are not ; for those of my friends who 
 have most withstood me have known nothing — nay, they will confound 
 one country with another, one colony with another, one purpose with 
 another. Some friends of this sort have withstood me, and, indped, teased 
 me. Do not you, my dear Severn, join them, or rather follow their 
 example, for they are silent at last. There is doubtless some risk of happi- 
 ness in any course a man may pursue, however promising ; but as it is now 
 too late, pray do not repeat your objections, because you throw a gloom 
 over my cheerful hopes. Your letter, though dated on 18th, did not 
 arrive till last night, when I had taken leave of Carlino. I almost wish 
 you had not arrived so early, because I am now strongly induced to visit 
 London before I go ; you need not press me to this, for my inclinations 
 are of themselves enough ; you may rely on my going to see you, if I can 
 get rid of business matters and other matters here in time. 
 
 " I resolved not to leave England and carry away with me the ' Life and 
 Eemains of Keats.' They will be confided for publication to Mr. E. M. 
 Milnes, M.P., whom, I believe, you know. At the close of the ' Life ' I 
 leave your letters, written at the time, copied verbatim, to tell the sad 
 story of his sufferings. I have attempted to make a selection from his 
 poems, but I find myself too partial to reject any, so Mr. Milnes must 
 exercise his judgment on that point; fori am well aware that a poet's 
 fame is more likely to be injured by the indiscriminate admiration of his 
 
 O 
 
194: LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 friends than by his critics. Mr. Milnes is a poet himself, an admirer of 
 Keats, and, in my mind, better able to sit iu judgment on a selection for 
 publication than any other man I know. 
 
 " The greater part of this letter is for your wife as well as for yourself ; 
 so, with my love to her, 
 
 " I am yours, ever truly, 
 
 " Ohas. Bkown." 
 
 The two among all Keats's friends whom Brown thought 
 best qualified — everything, from friendly intimacy to lite- 
 rary ability, considered — were John Hamilton Reynolds 
 and Leigh Hunt. Either of these might have been safely 
 trusted to produce what would at once be adequate and 
 satisfactory to Keats's friends, though the elder and better 
 known author could not have given so many personal 
 details, as he had never enjoyed 'that varied intimacy with 
 Keats with which the younger was privileged. Unfortu- 
 nately there were, in each instance, imperative reasons 
 against acceptance of the trust, or rather against undertak- 
 ing its accomplishment : and this apart from any action of 
 George Keats or the jealous ill-will of Mr. Dilke, and perhaps 
 Mr. Taylor. Again, Brown would gladly have entrusted the 
 ' Memoir ' to Benjamin Bailey, not only because Keats had 
 loved and admired him, and that the love and admiration 
 had been reciprocal, but on account of Bailey's literary 
 faculty, scholarly taste, and poetic insight, combined with 
 his very high estimate of Keats's place in our literature. 
 But by this time Bailey, who had won high preferment in 
 the Church, had gone abroad. Again, there was Charles 
 Cowden Clarke, who doubtless would have undertaken the 
 task aright, though Brown does not seem to have thought 
 of him in this connection. He did think of Edward Holmes, 
 but as a sympathetic friend rather than as a biographer. 
 With all his liking for Severn as a man, admiration for him 
 as an artist, and gratitude to him for his unforgetable 
 services to Keats, Brown was well aware, and frankly told 
 Severn, that a literary task of such importance could not 
 possibly be entrusted to him. Nor did he consider 
 Woodhouse's qualifications sufficient. He had thought 
 
KEATS'S POSSIBLE BIOGRAPHERS. 195 
 
 of Trelawny, of whom he had a very high opinion, but 
 wisely had entertained the idea only to dismiss it. There 
 remained, then, only G-eorge Keats, Charles W. Dilke, and 
 Mr. Taylor to be considered. The last-named was almost 
 out of the question : and all lovers of Keats must rejoice 
 that the work did not fall to that no doubt worthy Evan- 
 gelical publisher. As for Mr. Dilke, Brown not only 
 disliked him but shared Charles Lamb's opinion as to his 
 lack of real discrimination and taste. Finally, the ill- 
 feeling that existed between George Keats and Brown, 
 particularly on the part of the latter, made an arrangement 
 which would be mutually agreeable out of the question. 
 Brown was prejudiced, but he was not unfair, and still less 
 was he disloyal. He was willing to do what was best for 
 Keats's sake, even to surrendering entirely to George Keats, 
 to collaborating with or assisting even Dilke : indeed, he 
 was willing to admit that his judgments both of George 
 Keats and his sole English defender might be based upon 
 supposition and misunderstanding rather than unfavourable 
 facts, though he could not do so on the evidence before 
 him. The last letter he received from Dilke annoyed him 
 greatly, not so much by anything personally affronting as 
 by the writer's arrogance, or what seemed to Brown his 
 arrogance, in assuming that he knew more about Keats and 
 Keats's concerns and the Keats family and circumstances 
 generally than Brown, and Severn, and George Keats, and 
 indeed all concerned, put together. Dilke, it may be added, 
 wrote later on to Severn in somewhat the same strain. 
 
 Brown rightly concluded that Monckton Milnes, over and 
 above his literary qualifications, was the right man to 
 whom to depute the undertaking. If he could come to an 
 arrangement with George Keats, so much the better : in any 
 case, he would be assured of the assistance of the more 
 important members of the Keats circle. Brown wrote to 
 Hunt, Holmes, and others, and also formally deputed his 
 responsibility to Mr. Monckton Milnes. Mr. Milnes will- 
 ingly undertook to carry out loyally his friend's wishes. 
 
 With the death of George Keats in 1842 disappeared the . 
 
 o 2 
 
196 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 chief difficulty. Consent was in due time gained from his 
 widow and from Fanny Keats, then resident in Madrid as 
 the wife of Sefior de Llanos, a Spanish gentleman of high 
 mental and literary attainments. Four or five years elapsed 
 before Mr. Milnes had collected from various sources all the 
 then available information, and before his readiness and 
 the occasion coincided. The ' Life, Letters, and Literary 
 Eemains ' was published in the autumn of 1848.* In the 
 Preface, from which a partial quotation has already been 
 made, the following further words about Brown appear. 
 " Before he left this country he confided to my care all his 
 collections of Keats's writings, accompanied with a biogra- 
 phical notice, and I engaged to use them to the best of my 
 ability for the purpose of vindicating the character and 
 advancing the fame of his honoured friend." f It seems 
 that after Brown's departure from England, Monckton 
 Milnes was seized with sudden qualms as to his fitness for 
 the task which had been entrusted to him, and that he 
 would, indeed, have resigned it after all but for the earnest 
 advice, strong encouragement, and promised aid of Severn, 
 who by that time had, with his family, arrived in London. 
 
 * There may be given here Lord Houghton's (E. Monckton Milnes) 
 letter which was sent to Severn together with the first copy of the ' Life ' 
 which was issued. 
 
 "Deak Sevebst, 
 
 " The proofs of Keats's ' Life ' was sent by Moxon to Lord Jeffrey, to 
 try and get him to review it for the ' Edinburgh.' This is literally the first 
 copy made up. I did not show you the proofs, because I felt if I once 
 did so to any one of Keats's friends, and thus exposed myself to their 
 criticism, there was an end of the book, for I could not undertake to please 
 them. Even Reynolds, without whom the thing could not have been 
 done at all, has not seen a word in print. 
 
 " Yours always, 
 
 " R. M. Milnes. 
 " P.S. — The book is Moxon's, not mine." 
 
 f After acknowledgment of indebtedness to Leigh Hunt, C. Cowden 
 Clarke, Reynolds, Holmes, Felton Mathew, Haslam, and Dilke, he adds : 
 "I have already mentioned Mr. Severn, without whom I should jjkh 
 bably have never thought of undertaking the task, and who now offered 
 me the additional inducement of an excellent portrait of his friend to 
 prefix to the book : he has also in his possession a small full-length of 
 Keats sitting reading, which is considered a striking and characteristic 
 resemblance. 
 
LASI NEWS OF CHARLES BROWN. 197 
 
 From that time forward there is no record of Brown 
 beyond the letter he wrote to Severn shortly before his 
 death. No doubt he wrote several times from New Zealand, 
 but none of his letters seems to have been preserved : 
 strange, so far as Severn is concerned, as he had, almost 
 since his first arrival in Italy, carefully kept all his friend's 
 communications. 
 
 Brown was bitterly disappointed with his experience of 
 New Zealand, and in particular believed that he and 
 others had been grossly deceived as to the advantages of 
 New Plymouth (Taranaki), whither he had gone. Late 
 in January of 1842, he wrote to Severn complainingly 
 of these matters. 
 
 " New Plymouth, TaranaJci, New Zealand, 
 " 22nd January, 1842. 
 " My dear Severn, 
 
 " The Plymouth New Zealand Company have grievously disappointed 
 us, and I intend to proceed, as soon as I can, to return to England via 
 Sydney (as the cheapest way), perhaps leaving Carlino behind me, at least 
 for a short time. Our letters, it is surmised, have been opened, and, if 
 found to be unfavourable to the New Zealand Colonies, they never reach 
 their destination. We now entertain better hopes of our letters, , and 
 should this arrive at your hands, you will be of essential service in causing 
 it to be printed in the public papers as a caution to others not to put faith 
 in representations made by New Zealand companies. No one letter can 
 contain our grievances; but it is enough to tell you at present that. this 
 place has not a port except Port Hardy, 100 or 110 miles off, in D'Orville's 
 Island, nay, has not a roadstead, and is so dangerous to approach that, after 
 wrecks and various disasters, ships no more attempt it, and we are left 
 unsupplied, possibly, at last, to live on the fern root, which would soon 
 kill me. I was promised a Port by the Company for my money, and I 
 intend to protest against receiving any sections of land on this coast, and 
 to bring an action against the Company for their non-fulfilment of the 
 contract between us, I claiming a return of my money paid to them, 
 together with every expense to which I have been put, and damages of all 
 sorts which the law will allow. In the meantime, though much injured 
 in ' mind, body, and estate,' I shall not be a pauper, and, looking at your 
 hearty invitation just before I quitted England, it is my intention, should 
 my health and time of life permit me outlive the voyage, to offer myself 
 at your threshhold as your guest, — at any rate, for a moderate period. 
 My health and strength are certainly improved since last month, when I 
 feared I was irretrievably sinking under my grievances ; but since that 
 time I happily discovered a document from the Company, perhaps inad- 
 
198 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 vertently granted to me, though a very common one, and that seems to 
 promise me the fullest justice. Without it, I had not anything but verbal 
 promises, verbal representations — which are nothing in a legal point of 
 view. 
 
 " Think of our being compelled to take shipping to go to our Port ! the 
 impudence of such an attempt to fulfil a contract is scarcely imaginable. 
 But I have proof that my sections of land were engaged to be at the Port 
 of New Plymouth. Accordingly I demand to be conveyed to Port Hardy 
 (the declared Port), and there to take any sections of land ; but first the 
 Company must carry land thither, as it is little more than a naked, steep 
 rock ; enough of land/ at least, for our 201 acres : but though I expressed 
 our willingness, at a public meeting, to go thither, no answer was returned, 
 all looking aghast at the unexpected though reasonable turn I gave to 
 their discussion as to the best means to be adopted for obtaining a Port. 
 
 Carlino, I am glad to say, is well and in good spirits. I have written 
 much of my 'New Zealand Handbook;' not 'New Zealand Guide,' 
 because I cannot conscientiously guide, any one to it. 
 
 " Remember me most kindly to Mrs. Severn, and 
 
 " Believe me, ever yours truly, 
 
 " Chas. A. Brown." 
 
 The hope expressed in this letter, of again seeing Severn 
 in England, was not to be fulfilled. Ere long he was over- 
 come by another and more serious apoplectic fit, which 
 proved fatal.* 
 
 Thus died, in comparative isolation and disappointment, 
 one of the kindest and most genial of men, beloved by 
 nearly all who knew him, the most intimate of all the friends 
 of Keats till the poet went to Italy on the hazard of life. 
 On his grave in distant New Zealand one may believe that, 
 among the tall grasses which surround it, are a few ever- 
 green leaves from the laurel-wreath of the illustrious 
 friend whom he loved so deeply, and to whose memory he 
 was so scrupulously loyal, f 
 
 Shortly after his arrival in England with his family, 
 
 * His son, Mr. Charles Brown (" Carlino "), remained in New Zealand, 
 and became a prosperous colonist. 
 
 t The reader interested in Charles Brown should turn to the letters of 
 Alfred Domett and Jno. Geo. Cooke, particularly the second, quoted at 
 pp. 262 and 264, post. 
 
LETTER FROM MR. BILKE. 199 
 
 •Severn took up residence at 21, James Street, Bucking- 
 ham Gate. At first, however, he found accommodation at 
 a house in Burlington Gardens, and it was there that he 
 received the following letter from Mr. Dilke, in reply to one 
 from him concerning the Keats ' Memoir.' The truth of the 
 matter seems to be that Mr. Dilke acted, throughout, the 
 part of one who would neither do a thing himself nor allow 
 any one else to do it. In any case, it is a matter for 
 congratulation that he " had not sufficient leisure to attend 
 to anything " of the kind. 
 
 " 9, Lower Orosvenor Place, 
 
 " Sunday Evening. 1841. 
 " Dear Snt, 
 
 " 1 forward a dozen copies of the paper on Fresco. I am not even sure 
 that in my haste last night I thanked you for your intention of sending 
 me a second. Such papers are welcome, and 1 think serviceable to the 
 good cause. If you will let me know beforehand what number of copies 
 you would wish to have, they shall be reserved and sent. I have, directed 
 the printer to return the MS., and will then add the address of George 
 Keats in Louisville, Kentucky. Your note touched on other matters to 
 which I was unwilling to reply on the spur of the moment. I have no 
 doubt Mr. Milnes will do justice to the subject : — whether a stranger can 
 do, justice to the man is a question open to consideration. I have never 
 seen Brown's ' Memoir,' but the spirit of it was foreshadowed in his letter, 
 and that led to a quarrel — the ' be all and the end all ' of which was a 
 refusal on my part to reply elaborately to sixteen pages of charges against 
 George, conjured up out of the ambiguous givings-out of poor John, and 
 George's letters, who had intentionally mystified his brother for the peace 
 and quiet of his vexed and wearied spirit. You may say how could I 
 know this — do I pretend to know more of Keats's affairs than Keats 
 himself ! Yes, I assuredly know more than all the Keats [sic] put together. 
 How I acquired my knowledge would be a tedious story. It cost me 
 years of anxiety, the benefit of which Miss Keats had and enjoys, and even 
 George benefited by it, the only one among them that affected to be a 
 man of business, having given his guardian a receipt in full. To he sure, 
 Brown promised further to vindicate John from the attacks in the ' Quar- 
 terly ' and ' Blackwood ' — then [thus ?] to drag his memory through the 
 mire that had poisoned his living existence.* As if the fact that an 
 edition of his works were called for a quarter of a century after he had 
 been laid in his grave, was not vindication enough. As if the monument 
 
 * This does not seem as though Dilke knew more than all the Keats 
 circle. Brown, no more than Keats himself, would have fallen into the 
 mistake of supposing that the ' Quarterly ' and ' Blackwood ' " poisoned 
 the poet's existence." 
 
200 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 to his fame would be more genial in its influences if built up with the- 
 stones that had been hurled at his living head. As to George I have no 
 doubt that he would, on proper representation, forward Mr. Milnes's 
 views, and hold himself obliged. Years since I had full power from him 
 to treat for the copyright ot his brother's works, and he was most anxious 
 to bring out a handsome edition and sacrifice the cost if necessary. I fear 
 indeed that I alone am responsible that no such edition was published'. I 
 however had but little leisure at the time to attend to anything, and there- 
 were objections which do not perhaps now exist. These facts I state in 
 justice to George Keats, for such has of late years been the disarrangement 
 in all American affairs, that he may not now have it in his power to do 
 what he was then most anxious for. He must, however, be written to by 
 some one in whom he has confidence, for he does^feel that he has been 
 strangely treated. "While called on, and very properly, to pay every 
 shilling of his brother's debts, v/hich indeed he entered into legal engage- 
 ments to do at a time when he never hoped to receive a shilling from his 
 brother's estate, he never received book, letter, paper — no, not so much 
 as an old volume or a refuse sheet that had belonged to his brother. I 
 mention these facts because Louisville is not beyond the twopenny post, 
 and too for for explanation and rejoinders. If you mean to write yourself" 
 I have no doubt he would be happy to hear from you, because I know that 
 he is grateful for your kindness to his brother — but I doubt if he would be 
 very communicative to strangers. 
 
 " I should be happy to enter more freely into this subject could you 
 favour me with a call — or I would visit Burlington Gardens if I thought 
 it likely that I should find you disengaged. 
 
 " I am, my dear sir, 
 
 " Yours truly, 
 
 " C. W. Dilke." 
 
 One of the last acts of Severn before he left Rome was to 
 pay a farewell visit to the grave of Keats. He expected to 
 find no one at that solitary spot, and at that unusual hour,. 
 but to his surprise he saw two young people, evidently 
 lovers and as evidently English, kneeling (hand in hand) 
 and kissing the earth where lay the dust of the poet they 
 loved so well, and for whom they sorrowed so reverentially. 
 He did not disturb them, or advance : but, from his vantage,, 
 made a rapid sketch of the scene. 
 
 The painting from this sketch was the first picture — 
 apart from commissioned canvases on hand — which he 
 made after he had settled down to his new English life.. 
 ' At the Grave of Keats ' received as chief title the simpla- 
 but significant word : Fame. 
 
SEVERN'S LIFE IN LONDON. 201 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Severn's life in London — Keata's dying bequest to Severn — The West- 
 minster cartoons — Letters from Mr. Gladstone and Mary Shelley — 
 Portraits of Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Monckton Milnes — Death of 
 Haslam — Letter from Venice from Mr. Buskin — Letter from " Geo. 
 Gordon Byron" — Severn's frescoes and other art- work — Letter from 
 Mr. Euskin about Christian art — Severn's ' Folio- Adonais ' — The 
 vacant Consulship at Eome — Correspondence ■ — Severn appointed 
 Consul — Letters from Mr. Euskin. 
 
 Foe nearly twenty years there is little to chronicle of 
 Severn's life. From 1841 to the end of 1860 he enjoyed 
 an uneventful and industrious art-life in London, occupying 
 himself otherwise almost solely with domestic and social 
 interests, and, ever and again, with various literary under- 
 takings. At no time a good correspondent, though so 
 often the recipient of letters, he seems to have had little 
 intercourse with his friends in Italy, except by short notes 
 and casual messages ; nor do they appear to have been much 
 more communicative during his long stay in London. The 
 death of Charles Brown was a shock to him, though he had 
 been so far prepared for it by his friend's several serious 
 illnesses. Since Keats, he had intimately known and loved 
 no one so much. In a note to Charles Eastlake he says that 
 he feels as though his sense of youth had gone for ever, 
 with the death of that dear friend and comrade. 
 
 But, of course, he had many interests in London, apart 
 from those all-absorbing ones which he formed in his studio. 
 He was delighted to see his own people again; to meet 
 some of the friends whom he had known in those days when 
 the young poet had fraternised with . the young painter, 
 and had gone together to look at the Elgin Marbles, or for 
 
202 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 long walks into "the greening" (as Keats once exclaimed 
 the country in spring should be called), or had sat in the 
 low sitting-room at Hampstead and discussed Spenser, 
 Shakespere, and Milton; and glad also to resume ac- 
 quaintanceships made in Kome and elsewhere in Italy. He 
 had already won, in Eome, the friendship of Mr. Euskin. 
 Every reader of 'Praeterita' will remember the author's 
 account of how he first came upon Severn and George 
 Eichmond, at the former's house in the Via Easella, when 
 he visited Eome in 1840 ; and his delightful reminiscences 
 of Severn at that period. And now, in London, the latter 
 always found a hearty welcome at the house of Mr. Euskin, 
 senior, at Denmark Hill. He saw much of Eastlake, Uwins 
 and other fellow-artists, and, as he remarks later, in a 
 journal, was continually being surprised at meeting with, 
 or being called upon by, persons who sought or were glad 
 to encounter the man who had been the intimate friend 
 of Keats, and in whose arms the poet had died. There was 
 literally not a year of his life, in the close on sixty years 
 which followed the death of Keats, wherein he had not 
 cause to congratulate himself on having accompanied the 
 dying poet' to Italy, and to feel half perplexedly grateful 
 to the abiding influence of his dead friend. 
 
 " ' It seems to me that his love and gratitude have never ceased to 
 quicken with cool dews the springs of my life,' he wrote to William 
 Haslam : ' I owe almost everything to him, my best friends as well 
 as my artistic prosperity, my general happiness as well as my best 
 
 inspirations He turned to me suddenly on one occasion, 
 
 and, looking fixedly at me a long while with a fiery life in his eyes, 
 painfully large and glowing out of his hollow woe-wrought face, said, 
 ' Severn, I bequeath to you all the joy and prosperity I have never had.' 
 I thought our poor friend was waudering again; and soothed him 
 gently. ' This is the last Christmas I shall ever see — that I ever want 
 to see,' he paid vehemently, an hour later, and as though no interval 
 had elapsed ; ' but you will see many, and be happy. It would be a 
 second death for me if I knew that your goodness now was your loss 
 hereafter.' ... I have often remembered these words, and others he 
 often said to me, and I do believe that the dear fellow has never ceased to 
 help me. I thank God I am so happy as to live to see his growing fame. 
 It will be to my lasting honour to be bound up with him. I send you 
 an MS. with this, and Brown's letter. You may not have heard that 
 
LETTER FROM MR. GLADSTONE. 203 
 
 young B. [rown] is not coming back ; so you can write to him at New 
 Plymouth, Taranaky, as you suggest." . . . 
 
 In the first part of this letter, dated the 24th, Severn 
 speaks of his ardent hope of success in the Westminster 
 Cartoons competition ; and added incidentally that he was 
 fortunate in having the friendship of Mr. Gladstone : 
 
 "I am honoured in having won the friendly regard of this eminent 
 statesman, a man who is as great and worthy in himself as he ever can 
 be in politics. He is the latest, though probably not the last of the 
 men of eminence who have in the first instance been attracted to me on 
 account of their interest in Keats." At the end of the letter he adds : 
 " I am rejoiced to be able to tell you that I have just received a letter 
 from Mr. Gladstone, assuring me of the success of my cartoon. This 
 elates me greatly, and I, am encouraged to hope that there is a future 
 for historical art in this country after all — besides being relieved at my 
 necessarily improved prospects, a change of vital importance to me now 
 with my growing family and heavy responsibilities." * 
 
 This competition for one of the commissions to paint 
 the Westminster frescoes was one of the most exciting 
 episodes in Severn's life after his return to England from 
 Borne. 
 
 But here, for the sake of chronological sequence, room 
 may be found for the following letter from Mary Shelley. 
 It affords further evidence of the artistic side of that 
 remarkable woman's nature : 
 
 * Severn preserved this and several other letters from Mr. Gladstone. 
 " 13, C[arltori\ H[ouse] Terrace, 
 
 " June 24th, '43 (Night). 
 "My dear Sir, 
 
 " Mr. Rogers dined with me this evening, and hearing that the judges 
 had to-day been engaged in passing sentence on the cartoons, I ventured 
 to ask how one, which had for its subject the Princess Eleanor drawing 
 the poison from the wound of Edward in the Holy Land, had been con- 
 sidered to stand. He told me that I had better not tell him whose it 
 was, but that I might mention to the artist who drew it, that according 
 to the sentence of all the judges — except Lord Lansdowne, who had not 
 yet seen the cartoons — it was in the number of the successful and selected. 
 It gave me very great pleasure indeed to learn this, and I am anxious, in 
 case it should not have already reached you, to lose no time in making it 
 known. 
 
 " I remain, my dear Sir, 
 
 " Most faithfully yours, 
 
 "W. E. Gladstone." 
 
204 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Rue Neuve Clichy. No. 3 Rue de Clichy, a Paris, 
 
 15th Dec, 1843. 
 "Deak Me. Severn, 
 
 " It is some months now since, with the deepest regret, I left Italy. I 
 have been in England since, and continually intended seeing you ; but, not 
 remaining in London, I have not been able. I am now come over here- 
 for a few weeks. When I return I shall hasten to see you and Mrs. Severn. 
 I can never express how much obliged I was to you both for the letters 
 you sent to me for your acquaintances at Borne, who showed their respect 
 to you and their own goodness by the very great attentions they paid me. 
 I had hoped to spend this very winter in the Eternal City, but I must 
 wait for other days before I revisit it. I now write to you on a subject 
 in which I am much interested. I shall be truly obliged to you if you 
 will consider it and give me counsel and information. Do you know the 
 picture of Titian — the ' Woman taken in Adultery ' — did you ever see it ? 
 It was in the Galleria Calderara at Milan : the print at least you know, 
 made from it by Anderloni (Colnaghi, the printseller, has an impression). 
 Is it not the second best of that admirable master ? . The ' Assumption ' 
 being the best ? Is it not worth a very large price ? Would it not be an 
 excellent thing that our National Gallery should possess it ? A Milanese 
 nobleman possesses it, who does not consider himself rich enougb to retain 
 a capo d'opera of such great value, and wishes to sell it. He expects to 
 receive, of course, several thousand pounds. It is established genuine by 
 incontestable evidence, and is in excellent preservation. In size it is- 
 eleven feet by five. How could it be brought before the consideration of 
 those who might propose it to Government for. the National Gallery ? 
 Or indeed what is the right way to bring it before the. consideration of 
 Government? The difficulty seems to be that the picture is at Milan. 
 To bring it away will cost some hundred pounds, and its possessor wishes, 
 before he spends these, to have knowledge of how far it is probable that . 
 it can be sold in England. As far as I can judge by the print, and as 
 far as I know the value of so great a work of Titian, it seems to me that 
 we English ought to possess it, and that our National Gallery, not over 
 rich in first-rate paintings, would acquire great glory from possessing this 
 one. Its originality is, I am told, incontestable. Let me have a line of 
 advice, and telling me your ideas on the subject, as soon as you can. 
 
 " Ever yours, 
 
 " Maky Shelley." 
 
 Between 1848 and 1850, Severn painted, among others,, 
 portraits of Mr. Gladstone and Mr. Monckton Milnes. In a 
 brief (undated) note from Thomas Collins, it is stated that 
 Mr. Mote would be entrusted with the engraying of the 
 portrait of Mr. Gladstone. 
 
 Early in 1851 he heard with great regret of the death of 
 "William Haslam, the friend who had introduced him to- 
 
LETTER FROM MR. BUSKIN. 205 
 
 Keats some six and thirty years before, and for whom the 
 poet had always expressed a great regard. In a letter 
 written 9th February, 1852, by Mary Haslam, his wife, it is 
 stated that he broke down under the heavy pressure of 
 business and financial embarrassments, but that "his end 
 was peace." He died on the 28th of March, 1851. His 
 sister, whom Keats seems to have known also, was living 
 in Paris in 1876. 
 
 Most of Severn's correspondence for the next fifteen years 
 is of a merely casual and uninteresting kind. Far and 
 away the most interesting and remarkable letter which he 
 received was from Mr. Ruskin, shortly after the author of 
 ' Modern Painters ' had gone to Venice in 1843. Students 
 of Mr. Ruskin's work will note the suggestive fact that so 
 early as 1843 he wrote exactly as one might anticipate 
 his writing in any of his latter years. The letter was in 
 answer to one from Severn (whom he had come to know 
 through George Richmond ; in the first instance, in common 
 with Mr. Erskine of Linlathen, the Duke of Bedford, Mr. 
 ■Gladstone, and others, because of the interest of Severn's 
 association with Keats) telling him of the writer's success 
 in the Cartoon competition for the Westminster frescoes : 
 
 " Venice, 
 - My dear Sir, " Sept. 21st (1845 ?), 1843. 
 
 " I am sure you will excuse my not having answered your kind letter 
 before, when I tell you that I have been altogether unhinged by the 
 condition in which I have found Venice, and that every time I stir out 
 of doors I return too insensible to write or almost to speak to any one. 
 But I cannot longer defer expressing my sincere gladness at your well 
 ■deserved success, and my sympathy in all the 'enthusiasm of your hopes, 
 so far as regards your own aims and prospects, and I am also glad for the 
 sake of our national honour, that you are to be one of its supporters. 
 But with your hopes for the elevation of English art by means of fresco, 
 I cannot sympathise. I have not the remotest hope of anything of the 
 kind. It is not the material nor the space that can give us thoughts, 
 passions, or powers. I see on our Academy walls nothing but what is 
 ignoble in small pictures, and would be disgusting in large ones. I never 
 hear one word of genuine feeling issue from any one's mouth but yours, 
 ■and the two Bichmonds', and if it did, I don't believe the public of the 
 present day would understand it. It is not the love of fresco that we 
 want : it is the love of God and his creatures ; it is humility, and charity, 
 
206 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 and self-denial, and fasting, and prayer, it is a total change of character. 
 We want more faith, and less reasoning, less strength and more trust. 
 You neither want walls, nor plaster nor colours — ca nefait rien a Taffaire 
 — it is Giotto and Ghirlandajo and Angelico that you want, and that you 
 will and must want, until this disgusting nineteenth century has, I can't 
 say breathed, but steamed, its last. You want a serious love of art in 
 the people, and a faithful love of art in the artist, not a desire to be a 
 E.A., and to dine with the Queen : and you want something like decent 
 teaching in the Academy itself, good training of the thoughts, not of the 
 fingers, and good inpouring of knowledge, not of knocks. Never tell, or 
 think to tell, your lank-cockney, leaden-headed pupil what great art is, 
 but make a great man of him, and he'll find out. And a pretty way, by 
 the by, Mr. Eastlake takes to teach our British public a love of the right 
 thing, going and buying a disgusting, rubbishy, good-for-nothing, bad- 
 for-everything Eubens, and two brutal Gruidos, when we haven't got a 
 Perugino to bless ourselves with. But it don't matter, not a straw's 
 balance. I see what the world is coming to. We shall put it into a, 
 chain-armour of railroad, and then everybody will go everywhere every 
 day, until every place is like every other place, and then when they are 
 tired of changing stations and police, they will congregate in knots in 
 great cities, which will consist of club-houses, coffee-houses, and newspaper 
 ofiBces ; the churches will be turned into assembly rooms ; and people will 
 eat, sleep, and gamble to their graves. 
 
 " It isn't of any use to try and do anything for such an age as this. 
 We are a different race altogether from the men of old time ; we live in 
 drawing-rooms instead of deserts ; and work by the light of chandeliers 
 instead of volcanoes. I have been perfectly prostrated these two or three 
 days back by my first acquaintance with Tintoret; but then I feel as if I 
 had got introduced to a being from a planet a million of miles nearer the 
 sun, not to a mere earthly painter. As for our little bits of E.A.'s calling 
 themselves painters, it ought to be stopped directly. One might make a 
 mosaic of B.A.'s, perhaps ; with a good magnifying glass, big enough for 
 Tintoret to stand with one leg upon. . . . (Sept. 29th), if he balanced 
 himself like a gondolier. 
 
 " I thought the mischief was chiefly confined to the architecture here, 
 but Tintoret is going quite as fast. The Emperor of Austria is his G-eorge 
 Bobins. I went to the Scuola di San Bocco the other day, in heavy rain, 
 and found the floor half under water, from large pools from droppings 
 through the pictures on the ceiling, not through the sides or mouldings, 
 but the pictures themselves. They won't take care of them, nor sell 
 them, nor let anybody take care of them. 
 
 " I am glad to hear that the subjects of our frescoes are to be selected 
 from poets instead of historians ; but I don't like the selection of poets. 
 I think in a national work one ought not to allow any appearance of 
 acknowledgment of irreligious principle, and we ought to select those 
 poets chiefly who have best illustrated English character or have con- 
 tributed to form the prevailing tones of the English mind. Byron and 
 
LETTER FROM "GEO. GORDON BYRON." 207 
 
 Shelley I think inadmissible. I should substitute Wordsworth, and 
 Keats or Coleridge, and put Scott instead of Pope, whom one doesn't want 
 with Dryden. I think the ' Ancient Mariner ' would afford the highest 
 and most imaginative method of touching on England's sea character. 
 From Wordsworth you get her pastoral and patriarchal character, from 
 Scott her chivaliesque ; I don't know what you would get from either 
 Dryden or Pope, but I suppose you must have one of them. However, 
 anything is better than history, the most insipid of subjects. One often 
 talks of historical painting, but I mean religious always, for how often 
 does one see a picture of history worth a straw ? I declare I cannot at 
 this instant think of any one historical work that ever interested me. 
 
 " I beg your pardon very much for this hurried sulky scrawl, but 
 conceive how little one is fit for when one finds them covering the marble 
 palaces with stucco and painting them in stripes ! 
 
 "Allow me again to thank you exceedingly for your kind letter, and 
 to express my delight at the good news it contains, and believe me, with 
 compliments to Mrs. Severn, 
 
 " Ever most truly yours, 
 
 " J. Euskin." 
 
 Although the following letter from an unknown corre- 
 spondent is of considerably later date than that of Mr. 
 Euskin just quoted, it may for convenience' sake be given 
 at this place. Its date is somewhat uncertain. At first 
 sight the year seems plainly to be 1826; but as Byron 
 was born in 1788, it is obvious that he could not have had 
 a son old enough to act as his biographer two years after 
 his death in 1824. . Though it is difficult to see in the for- 
 mation of the third figure any resemblance to 4, the letter 
 probably was written in 1846, if for no other reason than 
 that it is addressed to Severn in London, when he was 
 living at 21, St. James Street, Buckingham Gate, whereas 
 in 1826 and 1836 he was in Eome. It is possible, but 
 unlikely, that it may have been written in 1856. It 
 caused the recipient no slight astonishment.* 
 
 " 2, King Street, Greenwich, 
 
 "June 22nd [1846?! 
 "Sir, 
 
 " I will not venture to offer an apology for the liberty of addressing 
 you, permit me to hope that the motive will serve as an excuse. I am 
 engaged at present in writing a life of the late Lord Byron, in a chapter of 
 
 * The 'Life of Byron' is by no means apocryphal, I ' understand ; 
 though the MS. has not yet come to light, and perhaps never will. 
 
208 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 » which I spea^.of poor Keats ; and to you as thefriend and companion of the 
 poet I would now appeal for such information and facts as you may have 
 treasured up in your memory. I am a great admirer of Keats as a poet 
 and as a man, and I shall with great pleasure receive the new editions of 
 his writings, which Mr. Monckton Milnes, if I am not misinformed, is at 
 present preparing. During my stay at Rome I frequently bent my steps 
 to the tombs of Keats and P. B. Shelley — those twin-brothers of mis- 
 fortune and disappointment — and well might a poet wish to find such a 
 last resting-place. I have longed to possess a memorial of Keats — may I 
 hope I shall not appear too presuming or selfish, if, in the ardour of 
 acquisition, I even make bold to say that J shall value highly any 
 record however ,tri vial, of your friend? The memory of Keats is almost 
 as dear to me as that of Byron, and how dear that is to my heart you will 
 conceive when I tell you (this in confidence) I am the son of the author 
 of ' Childe Harold.' Anticipating your pardon for this intrusion, I remain 
 with great respect, Sir, 
 
 " Tour obedient and humble servant, 
 
 " Geo. Gordon Bykon." 
 
 The following letter is interesting, though the second 
 sheet is missing and the writer is still unknown, All 
 enquiries at the British Museum Library and elsewhere 
 ' have failed to discover the " art-novel Titian " or its author- 
 ship. When the Severn MSS. came into the present writer's 
 hands, this letter was one of a packet of notes from Mr. 
 Gladstone, to whose penmanship, moreover, it might readily 
 be attributed. No doubt " Titian " will come to light some 
 day : or, at any rate, the writer of this note be discovered. 
 I do not think that the resemblance of Keats's features to 
 those of Oobden have been noticed by any one else. 
 
 " Oxford, 
 
 "April 15th, 1844. 
 " Dear Sib, 
 
 " I have been so much occupied since I had the pleasure of 
 
 receiving your note, that I could not earlier acknowledge it. I now 
 
 must thank you for so promptly and kindly writing to me. I am 
 
 gratified at finding that my conjecture was correct, and that you were 
 
 the Mr. Severn whose kindness soothed the dying moments of poor 
 
 Keats. I was a lad when he died, but recollect being struck then with a 
 
 sense of the injustice done him. The first poem of his I ever read was the 
 
 sonnet on first readiDg Chapman's ' Homer,' and that made me eager to 
 
 read more. Next I fell in with the ' Ode to a Grecian Urn,' and some 
 
 time elapsed before I met that glorious ' Ode to a Nightingale,' which I 
 
 thought then, as now, one of the finest things in the language. After 
 
SEVERN'S FRESCOES. 209 
 
 this, and when I could fully understand them, I read 'Endymion,' 
 ' Lamia,' ' Isabella,' ' The Eve of St. Agnes,' and ' The Hyperion.' The 
 two last, I fancy more than all the rest. 
 
 " Mr. Taylor, who was his publisher (32, Upyer Grower Street), shewed 
 me his bust and several portraits. You will bo surprised at the likeness 
 between these and that most poetical matter-of-fact man, Mr. Cobden. 
 
 " Perhaps you have seen Mr. Cobden, if so. the feature-resemblance and 
 the expression-likeneos must have struck you. 
 
 " If I had not felt deep interest in the personal history of John Keats, 
 perhaps I should not have written my art-novel, 'Titian.' That book 
 exhibits the struggles of a gifted mind — almost crushed by wrong, 
 neglect, and evil fortune. One part of the preface to ' Endymion ' I 
 quoted (' there is not a fiercer hell than the failure in a great object '), and 
 I preferred making a painter my hero, because it would have been 
 difficult to exhibit the struggles of a man of letters, — because in Titian's 
 case I could wind up with ultimate success, — and because the time, scene, 
 and personages were more susceptible of being picturesquely treated than 
 if I had a modern scene and person. 
 
 " But I need not take up this sheet with the intention of writing about 
 my own doings. You may see, however, " 
 
 Severn, however, with all his regard for Mr. Ruskin's 
 judgment, was not to be dissuaded from the desire to paint 
 frescoes. Naturally, he was the more eager to undertake 
 remunerative work of this kind on account of his waning 
 prosperity. He found that he could not sell pictures so 
 readily as before ; to some extent, no doubt, from the 
 greater supply and relatively less demand in London 
 beyond what he had experienced in Rome. He was glad 
 when he had one or two, even one commissioned picture 
 on hand. He even thought of resuming his old stand-by, 
 miniature painting ; but he soon ascertained that minia- 
 ture portraits were no longer the vogue. It was with 
 eager goodwill, therefore, that he availed himself of every 
 opportunity for decorative painting. His most important 
 undertaking of the kind was under the patronage of the 
 Countess of Warwick. 
 
 On the 24th of September he wrote to his mother : 
 
 " I am engaged in painting two large fresco-pictures, in many respects 
 the most important works I have ever done, as they are the first examples 
 in England of architecture being decorated with pictures in this style, 
 and also in that it is the first real opportunity I have ever had of producing 
 such things. The Countess of "Warwick is my liberal patroness, and 
 
 P 
 
210 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 lives here five months in the year. She received the place, a gift front 
 her son, the late Lord Monson, who died at the early age of twenty-five,, 
 in the year 1841. He had partly built this magnificent hall in imitation of 
 a fine building at Eome, and the building has remained unfinished ever 
 since. Cornelius, the great German painter, was to have done what I am 
 now doing, but Lord Monson's death changed the plan, and so it ha& 
 remained until Providence has .placed it in my hands that I may dis- 
 tinguish myself and get ample employment in this my favourite way. 
 Lord and Lady Warwick are very kind to me, and although I was a 
 stranger to them till a month ago, yet I am treated as a friend. There- 
 are no bounds to the praises they bestow on my progressing work, even 
 from the first outlines." 
 
 Among the more important pictures in oils painted by 
 Severn during this period, mention should be made of 
 'The Campagna of Eome' (bought by Mr. Gladstone); 
 two Koman-life pieces, for Sir Charles Lamb ; ' The Last 
 Days of Pompeii ' (Baroness Braye) ; ' Endymion asleep 
 on Latmos,' the features resembling those of Keats (Mr. 
 Elliott) ; ' The Villa d'Este at Tivoli,' and ' The Lake of 
 Albano ' (Major Eichard Sykes — who purchased at least 
 four pictures from Severn); 'The Lake of Nemi, from 
 Nemi' (Sir E. Vaughan); 'The Lake of Nemi, from 
 Genzano ' (?) ; ' Einaldo Eeposing ' (Sir Thomas D. 
 Acland); a larger and slightly enhanced rendering of 
 'The Praying Girl,' called 'The Praying Woman and 
 Child ' (Louisa, Lady Ashburton) ; and ' The Talisman ' 
 (Her Majesty Queen Victoria). 
 
 Subsequently he undertook some book and magazine 
 illustrating work, though he did nothing of any mark 
 in this genre. In 1853 he was invited to contribute one 
 or two drawings on wood to the first illustrated edition 
 of the ' Proverbial Philosophy.' 
 
 The example of his friend, Sir Charles Eastlake, and 
 the more immediate influence of two books, Mr. Euskin's 
 ' Modern Painters ' (Vol. II.) and Lord Lindsay's ' Sketches 
 of the History of Christian Art,' led Severn in 1847 and 
 the ensuing years to devote much of his spare time to 
 literary composition. In connection with Lord Lindsay's 
 book the following words by Mr. Euskin will be read with 
 the greatest interest. They occur in a letter written by 
 
I 
 
 . V 
 
 ft 
 
 ¥i&&% w4->/* i"&^-*- 
 
 iJ \ ~ ~ X- *k 
 
 EARLIEST STUDY FOB PICTUBE OP " AEIEL." 
 
 2b face page 2L0. 
 
LETTER FROM MR. RUSKIN. 211 
 
 him to Severn early in 1847, in reply to one concerning 
 the state of religious art in England.* 
 
 " What you say of the -want of feeling for Religious Art in England is 
 too true, but happily it exists more among the Artists than the Public. 
 There is a violent current of feeling turned that way at present, and I 
 anticipate much from Lord Lindsay's forthcoming book. Produce any- 
 thing we shall not, at present, but I fully anticipate seeing the Carraccis 
 and Murillos and Carlo Dolcis, and coarse copies of Titian and Rubens, 
 and all the tribe of the potsherd painters, and drunkard painters, cleared 
 out one by one from our Galleries ; their places supplied by Angelico, 
 Francia, and Perugino — so far as the works of these great men are 
 rescuable from the grasping apathy of the Italians, who hold them fast as 
 a dead man holds what was once near his heart, though it is no use to 
 him now. You may regret the state of things in England, but in Italy 
 it is something frightful. With us it is ignorance and bad teaching: 
 with them a mortal corruption of the whole mind. But there is one 
 element in the English mind, which will, I fear, keep it from doing any- 
 thing very pure in art — its consciousness of the ridiculous. So long as a 
 painter dreads giving a ludicrous idea/ — so long as he feels himself in 
 danger of laughing, or moclcing at anything — so long he is always 
 tumbling on the other side, and losing sight of Truth in the effort to be 
 sublime — losing sight of that genuine, heartfelt, faithful, loving realiza- 
 tion, which is the soul of Religious Art. Now the state of Italy at the 
 time of her greatest art, was something to put laughing nearly out of the 
 question. Battles like Montiaperto or Meloria — governors like Eccelino — 
 kings like Charles of Anjou — keep the corners of people's mouths down 
 wonderfully : and at the time of the great burst of Florentine intellect — 
 at the time of Dante — the great representation of all the brightest 
 qualities of the Italian mind — the public and private suffering and 
 exertion was so great, that I should hardly think a man in Florence ever 
 smiled. The portrait of Dante, which has been drawn with extreme love 
 and faithfulness by Giotto, and which is beyond all comparison the 
 finest example of that master I have ever seen, is in its quiet, earnest, 
 determined, gentle sadness, the very type of the spirit of the good men of 
 his time (and in his time men were either very good, or very bad) ; it is, 
 the ' sad-wise valour, the brave complexion, which leads the van and 
 swallows up the cities.' But you cannot conceive a smile on such a face 
 (and the Italians, even in their degradation, retain this peculiar incapacity, 
 they seem insensible to the ridiculous). Hence you will find, in all the 
 works of the time, a fervent desire to put pure truth before you, by 
 whatever means, or image it can be suggested. When Dante tells you 
 that the Head of Ugolino was in Hell so above that of the Archbishop 
 
 * For Mr. Buskin's estimate of Lord Lindsay's work, vide ' The 
 Quarterly Review ' for June, 1847 : " The Eagle's Nest," p. 49 : and 
 " Val d'Arno," p. 199, where he writes of Lord Lindsay as 'his first master 
 in Italian art.' ■ 
 
 p 2 
 
212 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVESN. 
 
 Euggieri that the one seemed to be hat to the other, he has evidently 
 not the slightest idea or fear of making you smile. His own feelings are 
 too intense and serious to admit of any the slightest degradation by 
 the image, and he says just what will make you understand the position 
 of the heads thoroughly. And so always : the souls meet and kiss in 
 Purgatory, [come] <SP ammusa I' una con I' altra formica — Forse a spiar lor 
 via — e lor fortuna. Guido Guinicelli plunges into the fire, come per 
 V acqua ilpesce undando alfondo. To anybody who has ever seen an ant 
 or a fish; these images explain the whole thing in a moment ; but a 
 modern poet would be mighty shy of such. Now the moment you can 
 sweep away all conventionalities, and manners, and fears, and give to an 
 Artist this fervent desire to tell the pure truth — and such intensity of 
 feeling as dreads no mockery — that moment you lay the foundation of a 
 great Art: and so long as you have artists who think of what will be 
 said, or who struggle to get something higher and better than God's 
 great truth, so long all you bring will be foam. It is inconceivable 
 how much this single defect in the English character prevents us and 
 pulls us back. A defect I call it : for I conceive there is nothing 
 ridiculous in the World. There is too much of the pitiable and the 
 melancholy ever to leave room for the ridiculous, and the tendency to 
 turn serious things into jests is a plague spot in us, which hardens us 
 and degrades us. George Herbert has it ' the witty man laughs least — 
 for wit is news only to ignorance.' Give a man a quick sense of all that 
 pollutes, of all that is 'earthy, sensual, devilish,' and no sense of that 
 which is to the vulgar laughable, and you will have a pure art. Till you 
 can do this there will be little done in England." 
 
 Severn projected a series of lectures upon the great 
 Italian artists, though he does not seem to have actually 
 written any, with the exception of a fragmentary paper 
 upon Eaphael. He set himself to the task of continuing 
 a romance of the time of Titian's residence in Kome, 
 in which the great artist plays a background part, begun 
 in Bome in 1839 under the title ' The Dead Hand,' but 
 ultimately intended for publication as ' Love's Trium- 
 virate.' Besides this ambitious undertaking, he wrote 'one 
 or two short stories ; a series of ' Imaginary Letters of the 
 Great Painters and their Contemporaries: Intended to 
 illustrate the theory of the application of Art to other 
 things, and of the Extraneous Influences that affect Great 
 Art ' (1848) ; one or two short essays on fresco painting ; 
 and miscellaneous papers upon art-subjects. 
 
 In the main, however, Severn's literary work was done 
 
SEVEBN'S ' FOLIO- AD ONAIS: 213 
 
 within the fifteen years following his return to Eome in 1861, 
 as British Consul. The only published writing of his that 
 is widely known — indeed, with the exception of a short 
 story called ' The Pale Bride,' his sole publication — is the 
 article in the ' Atlantic Monthly ' for 1863, so familiar to 
 all Keats students under its title 'On the Vicissitudes 
 of Keats's Fame.' The great wish of his latter years was 
 to see the publication of what he called his 'Adonais' 
 volume, which was a folio edition of the ' Adonais,' with 
 annotations and notes, to be illustrated after specially 
 made designs by himself and his two artist-sons Walter and 
 Arthur. The lines selected by Severn for his commentary, 
 or as his texts for occasionally lengthy notes, are these : 
 
 " Till the future dares 
 Forget the past." 
 
 " The third among the sons of light." 
 
 " Most musical of mourners, weep anew." 
 
 " But now thy youngest, dearest one, has perished, 
 The nursling of thy widowhood, who grew 
 Like a pale flower by some sad maiden cherished 
 And fed with true love's tears, instead of dew." 
 
 "To that hi^h Capital where Kingly Death 
 Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay 
 He came and bought with price of purest breath 
 A grave among the Eternal. . . ." 
 
 " Why linger, why turn back, why shrink, my heart ? — 
 Thy hopes are gone before : from all things here 
 They have departed ; thou shouldst now depart." 
 
 and, finally, the last stanza, ending — 
 
 " The soul of Adonais, like a star, 
 Beacons from the abode where the Eternal are !" 
 
 The publication was never undertaken : perhaps because 
 Severn's notes as they stood were insufficient (though he 
 intended to add many more, indeed to comprise in the 
 volume all his reminiscences of Keats), and partly, no 
 doubt, because none of the illustrations were done. 
 
 But all literary work was given up or postponed when 
 
214 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 the, to him all-important, chance of his obtaining the post 
 of British Consul at Home arrived.* 
 
 He was eager to get the office. The pleasure of being in 
 
 * To .this end he chiefly trusted to the influence of Mr. Gladstone and 
 to the recommendations of eminent men who had known hhn in R6me; 
 particularly Baron Bunsen, and Mr. Odo Russell (afterwards Lord 
 Ampthill). Having secured aid from these, he wrote to Mr. Monckton 
 Milnes, among others. This letter may be given first, as it indicates the 
 reason for the occurrence of a vacancy in the Roman Consulship. 
 
 "83a, Eccleston Square, , i ., . . 
 " Monday, October 22. 
 "My dear Milnes, 
 
 " I trust you will be glad to hear that I am a candidate for the consul- 
 ship at Rome about to be vacant by Mr. Charles Mausoleum Newton (who 
 is about to become my son-in-law) preferring the British Museum. 
 
 "Mr. Gladstone has given me a very warm friendly introduction to 
 Lord John Russell, explaining my real fitness for the place and even some 
 of the advantages of my having it. Also the good Baron Bunsen, with the 
 like friendship, has written to Lord John more particularly on my 
 capacity for the peculiar work, as at Rome I often had to act with him iu 
 the numerous services I was accustomed to render to my country-people. 
 Then my twenty years' Roman sojourn and my familiar acquaintance with 
 the Italian language and the historical literature, and the friendship and 
 patronage of Cardinal Weld (although I am a Protestant), gave me a fail- 
 standing which has never been impaired, and my large altar-piece at the 
 Cathedral of S. Paolo is the only public work in Italy by an Englishman. 
 But one singular service I could render : in finding rare works of art for 
 eur galleries and museums, and looking after them in these sad times. 
 
 " But you'll say ' what have I to do with all this rigmarole ? ' It is 
 this — I see that you are to be honoured with Lord Palmerston's visit, and 
 as you are famed for your attachment to your old friends, I think it just 
 possible that you may have a pretty moment wherein you can advocate my 
 elaim with your usual nailing eloquence — for you see I am most anxious 
 to return to dear old Borne. My six children (for whose education we 
 returned to England) being all well settled, my wife and I incline to a 
 'Darby and Joan ' life and to resume ' da capo ' in Italy. 
 
 " My health and strength are first rate and I am equal to any amount 
 of business, indeed beyond that of my first visit to Rome. 
 
 " So I will e'en hope that you yourself may remember some incidents of 
 my useful life at Rome, and be able to clench the nail already so well 
 driven in by Bunsen and Gladstone. I often had occasion to hear of Lord 
 Palmerston during the famed trial of mine of three years' Roman durance 
 and iniquity, which so annoyed Sir Brook Taylor and for which the former 
 Pope offered me a compensation through Chev. Bunsen. 
 
 " Please to understand that I do not now pretend to the Consulship for 
 the salary but for a solid return to the very useful life at Rome. My 
 painting flourishes and I have noble patronage — the Duke of Devonshire 
 (as I had the last), and my present works are thought to surpass all I 
 have done. You are almost the only friend never seeing them, but you 
 sent me charming excuses which was better. 
 " And I remain, 
 
 " Your anxious friend, 
 
 "Joseph Severn." 
 
THE VACANT CONSULSHIP AT ROME. 215 
 
 .London had waned, particularly as he realised with deep 
 .regret that a new movement of the tides of art was leaving 
 his " life's barque " stranded. No doubt a man of so much 
 .resource, of so winsome a personality, and with such 
 genuine if too often mediocre powers in art, would have found 
 enough employment to enable him to live in comfort. His 
 three eldest children were no longer dependent upon him : 
 and the three younger were likely soon to support them- 
 selves. Still, the struggle of life would have been a hard 
 one; indeed, so it had already become. The emoluments 
 of the Consular post at Eome were certainly not great, 
 but they ensured a competency. Moreover, a great desire 
 •came upon him to return to Rome, where the happiest as 
 well as the most prosperous years of his life had been spent. 
 He thought longingly of the place, of the life, of the 
 artistic atmosphere, and of the friends who still lived in 
 that city. 
 
 Before midsummer he had obtained all the needful letters 
 of recommendation. Early in June he wrote to his old 
 acquaintance, Dr. Quin : 
 
 " 83<z, Eccleston Square, 
 
 " 4th June, 1860. 
 " My deak Dk. Quin, 
 
 " I was distressed to find you so ill that you. could not see me, for you 
 have ever been a most kind and faithful friend through a long course of 
 years, unchanged amidst the change of everything about us. I told you of 
 my being a candidate for the Consulship at Eome. It prospers, as every 
 friend has given me a warm testimony ; and even the Queen, to whom my 
 daughter wrote, gave a favourable and gracious answer. The only 
 ■obstacle is a rule in the Foreign Office that each Consul on his first 
 appointment should not be more than fifty years of age. Now I am just 
 on the wrong side of it,* but my health, strength, and even sight place me 
 •comparatively on the right side of it; and it no* occurs to me that a 
 
 * A record of seventeen years on the wrong side is a goodly burden for 
 " just " to carry. An extract from his Journals in 1863 proves not only 
 that his disguise of his actual age was systematic, and for obvious reasons, 
 but that all accounts of his rare youthfulness and alertness of mind and body 
 must be unexaggarated. " To-day I attain the age of 70 ... . and 'tis 
 singular that I am obliged to conceal my, age most studiously, for my 
 office has to do with it and my enemies would triumph over me did they 
 know that I am now 70 years old, for I am considered as between 50 and 
 .60, but rather to the 50, so that ' favourable looks ' are my good fortune." 
 
216 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 testimonial from you, as a distinguished physician, would greatly help me, 
 for you have known me so long through all kinds of changes. Perhaps 
 my twenty years' sojourn at Eome gives a positive claim as to knowledge 
 of the language and people, and I trust that the happy success of my six 
 children may be some little addition to that claim. My artistic power 
 would enable me to look for rare works of Art, and attend the wants of 
 our English people. I propose to go to Eome in about a fortnight to 
 resume my Italian Art, independently of the Consulship, which may or 
 may not come to me, and if I do not ask too much in your present state 
 (though I beg you not to think of it, if it is the least inconvenience), it is 
 to write me a letter as a testimony (rather of my health and strength than 
 of my talent and character), or to Lord John Russell if you like, but 
 'twill be the same to me, as I have to enclose several. I should tell you 
 that the Chancellor of the Exchequer supports me warmly, as did the late 
 Baron Bunsen, and indeed I have reason to be pleased at the manifestation 
 in my favour and the joy expressed at the prospect of my being placed at 
 Rome. Good-bye, my dear Dr. Quin. I will hope that before I go I may 
 have the pleasure of seeing you and finding you recovered. 
 
 " Yours truly and obliged, 
 
 " Joseph Severn." 
 
 The letter from the Baron Bunsen, just referred to, may 
 be quoted here. It is addressed to Lord John Eussell, 
 and marked " private " : and has additional interest from 
 the political sagacity and foresight which it displays. It 
 was, moreover, one of the last letters despatched by its 
 distinguished writer, who dictated it from his death-bed. 
 
 " Bonn, 
 
 "12th October, 1860. 
 "My dear Lord, John, 
 
 " I have no hesitation in recommending to your kind notice Mr. Joseph 
 Severn, who I understand is anxious to obtain the British Consulship, now 
 vacant, at Rome. I believe Mr. Gladstone has already given him a warm 
 testimonial, but having known Mr. Severn for many years at Rome I can 
 testify to his peculiar fitness as a Consul there, for during the years he 
 spent at Rome he made himself universally useful and popular among the 
 English residents. I may also add that in an intrigue got up against him 
 by jealous Italian artists and the clerical party on account of an order 
 given him by Cardinal Weld for an altar piece in St. Paul's, Mr. Severn 
 had the whole of the more enlightened and liberal Italian public on his 
 side. From his intimate knowledge of Italian affairs and his social 
 relations with Romans of all classes, I should also consider him as very 
 likely to be useful to your diplomatic agents. I will conclude by saying 
 that I never knew an artist possessing so much practical knowledge and 
 ability as Mr. Severn. I am so suffering at present that I am not even 
 
SEVEBN APPOINTED CONSUL. 217 
 
 able to receive visits, much less to pay any, otherwise I could not have 
 denied myself the pleasure of waiting upon you while in this neighbour- 
 hood, but I cannot let this opportunity pass without expressing my sense 
 of gratitude as a statesman, a Christian, and a man, to you and Lord 
 Palmerston for having not only proclaimed but also enforced the principle 
 of non-intervention in Italy. I am sure you agree with me that Venetia 
 cannot in the long run be withheld from Italy, but at the same time, that 
 it would be a disgrace to Europe if the question could not be solved 
 without the aid of arms and the danger of a general European con- 
 flagration. I believe that not only the enlightened public all over Europe 
 but also a large proportion of public opinion in Austria, which is even 
 represented in the council of the Emperor, would hail such a solution with 
 the greatest satisfaction, supposing the financial interests of Austria and 
 the honour of the Imperial house were ensured. 
 
 " Pray believe me, ever yours faithfully, 
 
 " Bunsen." * 
 
 Severn, however, on the advice of Mr. Gladstone and 
 other friends, postponed his departure to Eome till after the 
 end of the year, or till he should hear definite news as to 
 the vacant post. His patience was rewarded by a welcome 
 note at the end of January, communicating to him his 
 election to the coveted office. 
 
 A few days before the good news, he received the 
 following cordially complimentary note from Mr. Ruskin ; 
 naturally, then and later, among the most valued of all the 
 letters sent to him or on his behalf at this time — for all his 
 disagreement from the writer in "minding the Raphael 
 cartoons or frescoes profoundly." 
 
 " Denmark Hill, 
 
 " 23rd January, 1861. 
 " Dear Me. Severn, 
 
 " Indeed it gives me great and unqualified pleasure to hear that you 
 wish to obtain the Eoman Consulate. What testimonial can I offer to 
 
 * On the day after his appointment Severn wrote to the Baroness Bunsen, 
 and attributes his success to her late husband's generously worded letter. 
 " I ventured to ask from the Foreign Minister that precious memorial, the 
 beautiful letter on my behalf dictated from the death-bed of that great 
 and good man. It was kindly sent me, and the appointment with it. 
 When I read the letter I at once understood how my success had been 
 
 brought about, and how that Ld. J. B. made up his mind It is 
 
 my earnest hope that I may be able to come up to the fair promise therein 
 made of me, made on the remembrance of thirty-five years of unbroken 
 friendship with which I was honoured and blessed, and which during that 
 long period never changed, except to increase till it came to that climax, 
 that most Christian act of love, that ensured my success." 
 
218 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 you, that will not be a thousand-fold out-testified by the consent of all 
 who know you, and who knew, in those old times of happy dwelling in 
 the ruinous Immortality of Eome : where English and Italians alike used 
 always to think of Mr. Severn as of a gleam of living sunshine — in which 
 there was no malaria of mind — and which set at one, and melted into 
 golden fellowship, all comfortless shadows and separations of society or of 
 heart. Consul! Truly and with most prosperous approbation it must 
 be.* I shall say with Menenius — 'Take my cap, Jupiter, and I thank 
 thee.' As for Raphael Cartoons or frescoes — you know I mind them not 
 profoundly, but all that I do mind profoundly I know that' you have eye 
 for also, and as I cannot fancy anything pleasanter for English people at 
 Eome than to have you for Consul, so I can fancy nothing more profitable 
 for English people at home than that your zeal and judgment should be 
 on the watch for straying treasures as in these changeful times may be 
 obtainable of otherwise unhoped for Italian art. I would say much more, 
 but in the hearing of your many and dear friends I feel all that I can say 
 would be but impertinence, and so pray you only to believe in my most 
 •earnest wishes for your success, on all conceivable grounds : and to believe 
 
 ame here and at Eome and everywhere, 
 
 " Affectionately yours, 
 
 " J. Ruskin. 
 
 "Sincerest regards to Miss Severn. I rejoice to hear Mr. Newton's t 
 ■coming to Home." 
 
 Shortly afterwards Severn wrote again to Mr. Buskin, 
 remarking how difficult it was to arrive at safe rules in the 
 study and practice of art: and how even the author of 
 Modem Painters could not always be taken literally. Mr. 
 Euskin's reply does not seem to have been kept by Severn : 
 at any rate, it has not come before the present writer. As, 
 however, it is known to have been in substance similar to 
 one written from Oxford at a later date to Severn's eldest 
 son Walter, then a young artist of singular promise, the 
 latter note may appropriately be quoted here : 
 
 * There are no inverted commas here, though the mention of M eneniu 
 in the next sentence gives the clue to their source. 
 
 Volt/mnia: " Honourable. Menenius, my boy Marcius approaches; for 
 the love of Juno, let's go." 
 
 Menenius : " Ha ! Marcius coming home ? " 
 
 Vol.: "Ay,, worthy Menenius ; and with most prosperous approbation." 
 
 Men. : " Take my cap, Jupiter, and I thank thee : " 
 
 — Coriolanus, Act II., Sc. 1. 
 r: t Miss Mary Severn married Mr. [afterwards Sir] Charles Newto n. Her 
 elder sister, Claudia, was at this time married to Mr. Predk. Ga le, the 
 well-known amateur cricketer. 
 
LETTER FBOM MB. BUSKIN. 219 
 
 " Corpus Chriati College, 
 
 " Oxford. 
 " My dear Waltek, 
 
 " I am very glad you like to talk, or write to me, and very inuch more 
 glad that you are in good spirits and have sold your pictures. They 
 deserved to sell, and you need not vex yourself at being out of the 
 ' Running.' To be in the Walking is far pleasanter. You do not need to 
 study from nature in the way you have planned, you may make good 
 sketches that way, as you do now, — but not so good as the hurried ones. 
 AVhat you do want is to draw any one thing, for once in your life, 
 thoroughly, as far as you can, and to get the roundings of it by real 
 drawing. To do this once would open your eyes to an entirely new order 
 of effects in nature, which are at present as invisible to you as if they 
 were of another world. Yes ; — myriads of people have been wrong by 
 reading Modern Painters. But that is because they pick out the bits 
 they like — as for the rest — ' Euskin's all wrong ; — we know better than 
 that.' But I have never yet known any one go wrong, who would do all 
 I bid him. Not that I know many such! Of course there are many 
 weak persons, who have really no invention. And these will draw still 
 life badly ; — but their invention would have been worse. 
 
 "Ever most truly and affectionately yours, 
 
 "J. Bttskin."* 
 
 One of the last things Severn amused himself with doing, 
 after all arrangements were made but before he had 
 
 * In this connection, room may be found here for two other letters 
 from Mr. Ruskin, both addressed to Mr. Walter Severn: the longer, 
 personal ; the shorter, a brief reply to an enquiry as to the meaning to be 
 conveyed in the titular words Fors Clavigera. Both notes were written 
 in March, 1875 : 
 
 (1) " The Fors is fortune, who is to the Life of Men what Atropos is to 
 their death, Unrepentant, — first represented, I believe, by the Etruscans 
 as fastening a nail into a beam with a hammer. (Jael to the Sisera of 
 lost opportunity.) My purpose is to show, in the lives of men, how their 
 Fortune appoints things irreversibly, while yet they are accurately 
 rewarded for effort and punished for cowardice and folly. 
 
 "J. Ruskin." 
 * * * * * 
 
 (2) " Brantwood, Coniston, 
 
 "March 26th, 1875. 
 "My deae Walter, 
 
 " I had better not put off, though I am hurried to-day, telling you how 
 glad I am to hear of any likelihood of your putting your power of sketch- 
 ing to real service. I have never myself seen anything so wonderful, in 
 its way, as your power of obtaining true and complete effects in limited 
 time. And if I were travelling myself in a country of which I wished to 
 •convey knowledge to others, I would rather have you for my aide-de- 
 camp than any other artist I know, without exception. I never saw so 
 steady truth united with so dashing rapidity, and I am even in some 
 ■doubt of the expediency of the advice I ventured to give you as to 
 
220 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 actually left for Borne, was to write the following humorous 
 parody of Hamlet's famous speech beginning, "To be, or 
 not to be." The occasion was the production of Mr. Walter 
 Severn's first etching : 
 
 " To bite, or not to bite, that is the question — 
 Whether 'tis nobler in the artist to suffer 
 The paleness, woolliness, and fog of dry-point 
 Or to- take arms against a sea of troubles 
 
 And, by opposing, end them ? To scratch, to bite 
 
 No more : and, by a bite, to say we end 
 
 The etching, and the thousand pallid things 
 
 The plate is heir to — 'Tis a consummation 
 
 Devoutly to be wish'd ! To scratch, to bite — 
 
 To bite, perchance to fail, aye there's the rub : 
 
 For in that failure what dire holes may come 
 
 When we have shuffled off upon the printer 
 
 What must us ease — There's the respect 
 
 That makes this etching seem so long a bore. 
 
 For who would bear the whips and scorns of fame, 
 
 The printers' cheat, the scorn of publishers, 
 
 The pangs of despised art, the plate condemn'd — _ 
 
 That patient etcher of the unworthy takes, 
 
 When he himself might his quietus make 
 
 With a bare Photograph. Who would etchings etch, 
 . To grunt and sweat over a greasy plate — 
 
 But that the dread of something after ' Bite,' 
 
 That undiscover'd process, from whose toils 
 
 No etcher e'er returns — puzzles the will 
 
 And makes us rather bear those ills we have 
 
 Than fly to others that we know not of? 
 
 Thus ' biting ' doth make cowards of us all ; 
 
 And thus the native hue of resolution 
 
 Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought ; 
 
 And etchings of no strength at all or moment 
 
 With this regard, in bitings pass away 
 
 And lose the name of action — Soft you, now ! 
 
 Be all my pangs forgotten ! " 
 
 methods of more detailed study. As a traveller your method is the best 
 possible. If, indeed, you were to stay at home, and wished bringing out 
 all your higher gifts, you would need other kinds of practice, but they 
 would diminish your rapidity and courage, and scarcely add, for public 
 service, to your skill. 
 
 " Ever affectionately yours, 
 
 "J. Euskin." 
 
MB. BUSKIN ON THE EAST WIND. 221 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 joseph Severn's miscellaneous writings. 
 
 Mr. Ruskinon the East wind — ' Imaginary Letters ' — 'Michael Angelo to 
 Vittoria Colonna ' — ' Fra Savonarola to Fra Bartolomeo ' — ' Galileo to 
 Milton ' — Light and Sound : A New Theory ' — ' Divine origin of the 
 octave' — Severn's story: 'The Pale Bride' — Severn's novel: 'The 
 Dead Hand' — Projected novel : ' The lost Throne.' 
 
 Of the several literary undertakings of Joseph Severn, the 
 earliest of any note is the series of imaginary letters from the 
 great painters and their correspondents, written in 1848. 
 The drift of the series is " to illustrate the theory of the 
 application of the principles of Art to life, and vice versa." 
 "We are at last emerging," writes Severn, after some 
 remarks on the spirit of sectarianism having been the great 
 blight of art in England, " from these ugly, whitewashed 
 puritanical blights, which have pressed down upon us as 
 a nation; just as London is commonly in gloom from a 
 vast rolling billow of fog or smoke, worse always when 
 blowing from the east,* but at all times causing heaviness 
 of spirit, and innumerable moral and physical evils, a 
 similar murky cloud of Puritanism and Sectarianism, or by 
 whatever name the thing be best called, is always striving 
 to manufacture a besom wherewith to sweep away all the 
 rainbow-glories of the imagination, all that innocent sun- 
 shine of life, wherein we love to recreate new brightened 
 ways for otir tired wandering feet, such as we see so 
 
 * "lam so glad Mrs. Severn likes my fresh strawberries. I should 
 have had pretty ones by this time, but for this fiendish east wind, which 
 gives me a deep and true horror, and is, rightly thought of, a plague such 
 as centuries have not witnessed." (From a Letter from Mr. Buskin.) 
 
222 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 readily as children when we do not place tyrannic bonds- 
 upon our imagination." 
 
 It was an undertaking, however, for which Severn was 
 quite unfit. He was no critic, nor was he a scholarly 
 student of his own or any other literature ; while even of 
 the history of Italian painting he had but an unsystematised 
 knowledge. With all his familiarity with Eaphael or 
 Michael Angelo he could at no time have written anything 
 of importance upon either, for not only was he by nature of 
 an uncritical mind, to which comparative estimates were as 
 alien as purely sesthetical appreciations, but he had never, 
 pen in hand, that concentrative faculty which, brush in hand, 
 was his safeguard and strength. Moreover, by 1848 his 
 literary experiments had been too few and unimportant to- 
 enable him to write with any ease or even correctness. 
 Possibly, he might have succeeded with a simpler subject 
 or less ambitious scheme ; though even when, some fifteen 
 years later, he wrote his article on the "Vicissitudes of 
 Keats' Fame," it had to undergo much necessary revision 
 from the editor of the Atlantic Monthly. His Reminiscences, 
 whether written in the " fifties," " sixties," or " seventies," 
 could not possibly be printed as they are ; though, it may 
 be added, only small technical corrections are needed 
 wherever he writes as it were straight from his heart, as 
 in his loving recollections of Keats. His foremost literary 
 achievement of a non-reminiscent nature is in his novel, and 
 thereafter one or two art-essays written in the " seventies." 
 He was so excellent a raconteur that he might have been, 
 able to train himself to become a successful novelist; 
 and no doubt he was much better qualified to write a 
 romance than to enter into rivalry with Walter Savage 
 Landor in a field which that master of literary form had 
 made his own. His novel was admired by Odo Eussell 
 and other good judges ; an. Italian lady, his friend the 
 Countess Lovatti, wished to translate it into her own, 
 language ; and Heine's friend, the eccentric Countess de la 
 Eocca, wished to render it into German, and even did go 
 some length with it. But by 1848 his radical literary 
 
"IMAGINARY LETTERS." 223 
 
 faults of slovenliness of expression, inconsequence, and 
 indifference to essential particulars, were not to be over- 
 come. It would, therefore, serve no good end to place the 
 series of these " Imaginary Letters " before the reader, 
 particularly as few of them have any " fundamental brain- 
 work " to justify the labour of much revision. But as 
 Severn thought well of his unfinished book, and as they 
 afford hints of the man himself, they should not wholly 
 be put aside. Three of the shortest may be given: as it 
 happens, they call for comparatively slight revision. 
 
 " Michel Angelo to Donna Vittoria Colonna. 
 
 " Rome, 
 
 "April, 1520. 
 " Fair and Accomplished Lady, 
 
 "When I wrote you the description of the Transfiguration of 
 Baffaello <T Urbino I had just had the gratification of finding the gifted 
 painter at work on the head of Christ. At that time it seemed to me 
 perfect, and yet I am assured he went on finishing it as if it were to 
 be the last of his works — and the last it is, for he has been suddenly cut 
 off by a fever at the untimely age of thirty-seven. All Eome weeps for 
 him, from Pope Clement down to the commonest lovers of the Arts. To 
 me this sudden news has been doubly painful, as only a few days since I 
 saw him alive in all the brightness of his geDius and manhood, engaged on 
 an immortal work, which he seemed to execute with ease and even gaiety. 
 When I looked upon the work and upon the painter, the one containing 
 such depths of art, such powers of originality ; and the other with such 
 gentleness of nature, in person and in mind; I then thought him the 
 happiest of mortals. Now I have seen him pale in death, stretched on his 
 untimely bier. The undying work of the Transfiguration on which he 
 was occupied, and which his sorrowing disciples had placed at his head, 
 seemed like his soul still hovering amongst us. He is gone, but in this 
 sublime work he painted the way he had to go and which we have to 
 follow. Still in death the same calm smile as in life lay on his beautiful 
 countenance. When I looked on the picture and the painter's lifeless form 
 together, the work increased in my estimation. How noble a trait is it, in 
 this immoral age, that his latest work is proper to be placed over the artist 
 on his deathbed. Ah ! how great a change, what a test ! How few show 
 such real power in their works that any is at death thought worthy to be 
 placed about them. Here is a proof that painting ought and must carry 
 with it a moral purpose to be really effective and great. Here am I, an 
 old man in comparison, receiving a lesson in Art and Eeligion from one so 
 much younger. The direct cause of his death is differently related ; the 
 physician tries to defend himself from the universal condemnation. 
 
224 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Raffaello had been suddenly called by the Cardinal Biario about the 
 Vatican frescoes, and hurrying to and fro on this important business in 
 the first great heat, he took a fever, and the Doctor imprudently bled him, 
 when he was too weak and delicate to bear it. I give you the account as 
 I received it from Griulio Romano, who now takes the artist's place, and is 
 his executor. Perhaps the most extraordinary thing about this extraor- 
 dinary being is that the talents which in other men excite envy and 
 jealousy and all bad feelings, in him inspired the most ardent friendship 
 in the various professors of Art who were so fortunate as to know him. He 
 won them to his purposes of carrying out divers works, by the fascination 
 of his manners, and the splendour that attended his footsteps. Hundreds 
 of artists were employed by him. Prom every part of Italy he employed 
 them to copy from the early works in all three arts, and he even sent into 
 Greece two young men, a painter and a sculptor, to model the works of 
 Phidias at Athens. How truly does he seem to have been born for the 
 advancement of the art ! To him it was immaterial what he took from other 
 men's works, as he always added more of his own. In some cases he has 
 introduced whole figures from the works of others, which stand with more 
 propriety and effect in his, than even in the originals. He was destined to 
 improve everything he touched. The figure of Christ in the Transfigura- 
 tion 1 remember on an old fresco near Florence, but how he has ennobled it ; 
 who ever cared for it until he condescended to copy and improve it ! He 
 has left a glorious example in his Vatican labour. No doubt he-was able 
 to produce so many works (an unrivalled number when we consider his 
 age) by the judicious selection of his helpers ; as well as that his style was 
 one that enchanted his scholars. May one dare to suppose that he was so 
 suddenly taken from the world as he had given the highest perfection to 
 the Art that humanity is capable of? 
 
 " Addio, my beloved and accomplished friend, 
 
 " Your faithful but antique St., 
 
 " M. A. Br/ONAROTTI." 
 
 "Fba Savonarola to Fra Bartolommeo. 
 
 " Florence. 
 " Esteemed Brother in God, — 
 
 " There are so many misstatements and falsehoods chattered about 
 in malice as regards those parts of the doctrines which I preach concerning 
 the fine arts, that I am induced to take up the pen to write to yon, my 
 believing friend, who, in the midst of the scandals of Rome, I know will 
 stand up, vindicate, and even paint for the cause I am sinking under. 
 You will perhaps even return to your persecuted friend when you leam 
 all the disasters that surround and hem me in. You have shown to the 
 world what the purity of art can effect. You have shown the loveliness 
 and charm of painting in raising our passion for the arts above the 
 grovelling degradations of humanity, and therefore can well understand 
 why I am so unjustly called the persecutor of the Fine Arts, when I have 
 merely attacked the vicious tendency and irreligious nature of our °reat 
 
" OALILEO TO MILTON." 225 
 
 Florentine works. I confess to you that I havo with my own soul 
 denounced these wickednesses in every way that seemed to me effective ; 
 that I have prayed whole nights to our blessed Bedeemer that He would 
 make me the instrument to dash to the ground these pagan works, which, 
 fostered and caressed at Rome in the very nostrils of the Pope, are yet 
 the sinful cause of gross idolatry and profligaoy — aye, and even paganism 
 in all shapes and tendencies. For this I have laboured to raise painting 
 to be the handmaid of devotion, for there is nothing so simple and 
 touching wherewith to impress the vulgar with the blessed truths of our 
 Holy Eeligion. And Christ in His benign goodness looked down and 
 blessed my humble efforts, even to the destruction of all the works of Art 
 in Florence, and now when I am looking about to reap the fruits of my 
 preachinix, these fickle Florentines have turned about, neither rejoicing in 
 the loss of their works of Art, nor finding a purer life in accord with their 
 inclination. The Pope's spies are amongst them, instigating their minds 
 to destroy me. Oh, my dear brother and friend, fly to my aid ; for I am 
 sinking, and long for those days to return when you and I, in the 
 Monastery of Santa Maria di Fiori, devoted our minds to these divine 
 objects for the restoration of pure religion. Now that so much has been 
 •effected, come back to my aid, I implore you ; for our task is only half 
 done, and, alone, I am sure to sink under the weight of malice and 
 treachery that is bristling up about me. But you may like to know from 
 me the history of the late great bonfire, when I revelled in the destruction 
 of all these profane works. 
 
 " You must know in the first place that I had long perceived a desire 
 in the Florentines to give up all these wicked things, and I proposed that 
 a large pile of wood should be kindled in the square of Santa Maria, and 
 that every good Christian should fling into the fire every work of Art, be 
 it picture, engraving, or even statue, that dishonoured the cause of religion 
 and decency. Thousands at my bidding brought their various works of 
 Art, and with their own hands threw them into the flames. This con- 
 tinued a whole morning, and I did all in my power to encourage the 
 cleansing the city of such pestiferous wealth. The memory of that day 
 begins to pass away, and the Pope's spies accuse me of heresy, and so 
 I have now to prove that my faith is orthodox ; and that it is solely 
 against the luxury of the church, its pagan practices and mundane disci- 
 pline, that I have contended. I yet fear that I may not prevail, and that 
 the wicked power of the abused church may crush me. 
 
 " (Unsigned.) " 
 
 "Galileo to Milton. 
 
 " My kevered Friend, — 
 
 " When I first had the singular happiness to be visited' by you in 
 the Inquisition prison, we discoursed on the light and truth of those 
 immortal subjects for which I was suffering in darkness for having 
 proclaimed and for having persisted in. Then it was that we swore in 
 
 Q 
 
226 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 the silence of our hearts, to live and die for these things. As we were not 
 allowed to speak on them, no doubt we felt them the more. What 
 changes your dear country is undergoing for the cause of truth ; really it 
 would seem that mortals were destined never to arrive at it, but blunder- 
 ingly — that the light of truth so dazzled them that they never could see 
 their way, but with a blaze-before them indistinct in its nature, and with 
 darkened perils under their feet. I received your noble sonnet on the 
 massacre of the Italian Protestants in the Alpine Valleys of Piedmont, 
 and shed many tears over it in secret, as every true Christian must. 
 From it I conclude that all your works are necessarily of a pathetic nature, 
 like the conflict of the times you live in. Yet here in Italy we are in a 
 little outward sunshine, both in Eeligion and Politics, and there may be 
 fine things going on, which, not being allowed by the Inquisition to tell 
 the truth, yet hold up an agreeable aspect of beauty and nature. No- 
 soul-stirring truth is told, but yet no falsehood is disseminated. Of this 
 description just now there is a new fresco picture, by Guido, at the' 
 Eospigliosi Palace, which seems to me, as it seems to everybody, the 
 most lovely work ever done. It represents Aurora flying onward, dis- 
 pelling the night and its vapours of gloom. She gaily throws about her 
 numerous flowers, which seem to collect the dew as they fall towards the 
 grateful earth. She is a beautiful and graceful figure in ample flying 
 folds of saffron windings, which do not conceal her feet, with which the- 
 earth is to he blessed. 
 
 " She looks round on the ample light and radiant power of Apollo, 
 who in his never-resting car guides his bounding Steeds, who seem to 
 splash about the light he breathes on all sides ; but more particularly he- 
 seems to inspire the gentle hand-in-handed Hours who so gratefully encircle- 
 his car, that he seems almost upheld by them. There is no end of their 
 varied attitudes: some are turned from you like the hours you lose, some 
 look cheerfully and catch your eye like the moments you profit by and 
 enjoy, but they all go tripping on to show you the moral that Time never 
 stops. All this golden light would be overpowering were it not that 
 Guido has given one little touch of contrast, for down below on the right- 
 hand side, deep under Aurora, you see the fresh blue mysterious sea, dark 
 and lovely in its nature, yet about to be impressed with the moving light- 
 which has already begun to tinge its shore. 
 
 " This singularly fine work is on the ceiling. Carlo Maratti pointed 
 out to me that Guido, in the happy composition of the Hours, had availed 
 himself of an antique bas-relief at the Villa Borghese, which may also 
 have given to him the idea of the picture ; but if so, like a great genius, 
 he has made the adaptation beautiful to our eyes by the marvellous way he 
 has set it. In the marble I should not have been struck so much with 
 the three figures hand in hand, but when they are made to represent the- 
 hours about the car of Apollo, then it is that the beauty comes out. 
 Eeally it would seem that the application of a fine thing were superior to- 
 the invention of it, and this would account for so many great things 
 having remained dormant for ages until some masterhand found the way 
 
'LIGHT AND SOUND: A NEW THEORY.' 227 
 
 to apply and make the thing useful. This work is done for Cardinal 
 Barbarini, and is thought to be the chef-d'oeuvre of the fascinating Artist. 
 
 "(Unsigned.)" 
 
 If the shortcomings of Severn's essay on ' Nature's Law 
 of Harmony in Colours,' and that ' On the Superstition of 
 the Etruscans ' were merely literary, these articles might 
 be revised and published. Unfortunately they have the 
 radical drawback that they were written in ignorance of 
 the works of specialists, and even, it must be admitted, in 
 ignorance of the subjects treated. The reason for writing 
 his Etruscan essay, as given by Severn, is his astonishment 
 at Mr. Dennis, in his great work on Etrurian remains, 
 having omitted to describe or even perceive, what from the 
 outset Mr. Dennis had known, and had continuously 
 demonstrated : namely, that the ancient Etrurians were a 
 distinct people from the Latins, with different ethical 
 conceptions, and, in a word, with a wholly peculiar method 
 and manner in the conduct of their ceremonials of death. 
 
 The essay on ' Light and Sound : A New Theory,' is 
 merely a longer, more intelligible, though not more 
 scientific, version of ' Nature's Law of Harmony in Colours.' 
 The only really original things in this " new theory " are 
 the few evidences of close observance of colour-effects 
 — and, pre-eminently, the extraordinary theory as to 
 the divine origin and nature of the octave in Music. It 
 may, however, be given in extenso, if for nothing else than 
 as an example of Severn's method and manner in an art 
 wherein he was in every way unfitted to excel. Severn 
 himself thought highly of this essay, which is a further 
 reason for its inclusion. In the Diary entry (July, 1873) 
 relating to it, he states that it was written that day in four 
 hours, after he had "tried to give it form and place for 
 five years." 
 
 ON LIGHT AND SOUND. 
 
 A New Theory by Joseph Sevebn. 
 
 In that magic beauty of sunset, which is felt universally, in the splendid 
 
 colouring of every object down to the smallest leaf, the eye is so gratified 
 
 as to seek and prefer that moment to every other wherein to behold the 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 aspect of nature. The cause of this charm is, that every object at sunset 
 is illuminated with the prismatic colours. The moment the sun goes 
 down below the horizon, the rays are reflected on the atmosphere round 
 the earth, and thus the exquisite colours seen in the prism are thrown on 
 every object. 
 
 This may be observed when the sun's rays show the colours, particularly 
 under the roofs on the walls when the orange, yellow, and red rays form a 
 beautiful band ; while on objects that are shaded from the sky, the most 
 intense blue, like ultramarine, may be seen. At this moment the sky 
 overhead actually throws a stronger light than the sun itself, which, 
 although it is below the horizon, yet illuminates the sky, though not with 
 prismatic light. 
 
 The prism, discovered by Sir Isaac Newton, gives the colours which 
 compose the light distinctly, and thus when passing through the glass 
 triangle the rays are broken, as in the sun at sunset. 
 
 It is this sublime moment which the great Titian generally represents 
 in his works, and more particularly in the picture at Rome, called the 
 ' Sacred and Profane Love.' The two figures are sitting on a sarcophagus, 
 one in a white dress, the other naked, but with a red mantle falling from 
 the shoulder, and a white girdle round the waist. The very fine landscape 
 gives the effect of the sun when just below the horizon, so that every 
 object has the golden outlines. But the ample cool light from the sky 
 falls on the two figures, giving little or no shade. This fine work forms 
 the most remarkable contrast to the shade-hunting pictures of the 
 Bologna school. 
 
 The most striking example of reflected sun's rays I remember, was at 
 Tivoli, in the Grotto of Neptune. Before the course of the river was 
 changed, a large portion of the water dashed through the grotto, and at 
 a certain hour in the morning the sun's rays entered this dark grotto, and 
 were reflected or broken on the spray. The effect was sublime, for in the 
 dark cavern the colours, red, yellow, blue, green, and orange, were seen in 
 all their purity, a lovely Iris which danced about on the spray, and in its 
 brilliancy seemed like a divine spirit. 
 
 It was this sublime sight which first suggested my enquiry into the 
 Teal nature of Light. 
 
 Being in Italy, where the clearness of the atmosphere reveals more 
 readily the colours composing Light, I was enabled to carry out my 
 enquiries. One evening I observed the orange and red tints under the 
 hat of a friend, extending two or three inches down from his forehead, 
 and on his gently lifting his hat at my request I saw the colours go with 
 it, leaving the clear sky-light on his face. Experimenting in this fashion 
 I plainly apprehended the principle by which Titian painted. 
 
 In the composition of light (of the five colours, with black and white) 
 the first thing to observe is its unchangeableness, for the colours remain 
 the same under every remove of the prism— in their positions and in their 
 proportions— and this Law of Nature extends to the harmony of colours 
 in a most beautiful and mysterious way. 
 
'DIVINE ORIGIN OF THE OCTAVE. 229 
 
 If any one of the colours is examined in the sun, the eye instantly of 
 itself forms the contrasting or complementary colour — viz., if a red wafer 
 be placed on a sheet of white paper, and be looked at in the sun, in a 
 short time a green wafer will be seen by the side of it. If a yellow wafer 
 be placed in the same way, and looked at in the sun, in a short time a 
 purple wafer will be seen by the side of it — and if a blue wafer be placed, 
 an orange wafer will be the result. 
 
 This remarkable property in the eye is a subtle law of nature as regards 
 harmony of colours. So that whatever we look at as regards colour, the 
 eye involuntarily forms the complementary colour. Thus to red, green is 
 formed by the eye, which being composed by yellow and blue, completes 
 the diagram as formed by nature. As it is the same of the other colours, 
 not only the blue and yellow, but also all the various tints may be 
 compounded of the three primitive colours, so nature has given to the 
 human eye (visibly) to form the contrast which contributes the actual 
 harmony. 
 
 Even to the black and white the same rule invariably applies — viz., if a 
 black wafer be placed on the white paper, and looked at in the sun, a 
 white wafer will immediately be seen by the side of it — and vice versa, if 
 a white wafer, though on a grey ground, a black one will be seen. 
 
 In attempting to explain this marvellous property in the eye I am not 
 aware but that I may be attempting it for the first time, or that it may 
 be more clearly done by some one else, of whom I am not aware. 
 
 If the eye be somewhat constrained by the finger in the inner corner 
 towards the nose, a brilliant Iris will be seen within on the other side of 
 the eye, and only by " the mind's eye." This I take it is the wonderful 
 way nature forms the harmony, and forms it continually. This external 
 Iris is an invisible part of the Brain, for in the description of the Brain I 
 have never met with any notice of it, and I am now laying greater stress 
 upon it to demonstrate how kindly nature instructs us in the law ot 
 harmony without any intuition but nature's impulse. This law of 
 harmony extends to sound in music quite on the same principle as in 
 colours, and the human ear has the same property of forming harmonies. 
 
 And I have often heard that in one instance of very fine ears, if 
 a note were struck, the ear immediately formed the third, fifth and 
 octave to it. 
 
 The scale of colours and that of sounds seem to me almost the same — 
 viz., the red, yellow, and blue form the treble, tenor and bass. The 
 green, orange, and purple form the contralto, the high tenor, and the 
 baritone. 
 
 Then the octave, which we receive from nature, and is not only born 
 with us, but must have existed in all times, and in the same proportions ; 
 this octave must have been the same to the ancient Greeks as to other 
 nations. It is perhaps one of the most mysterious links with the invisible 
 world, that this property of sound always exists, though we cannot tell, 
 how we got it, or how we exercise it, for in an instant we perceive a note 
 out of tune : how is this ? 
 
230 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 The octave in music is the most charming mystery in nature, and its 
 form is so positive that we may fairly conclude that it exists in the unseen 
 world invariably the same. 
 
 Light is more apparent to us, but none the less coming to us from 
 another world unchangeable in its nature like the sounds. 
 
 The octave in music is composed thus : — 
 
 From the 1st to the 2nd is a whole tone. 
 Prom the 2nd to the 3rd is a whole tone. 
 From the 3rd to the 4th is a whole tone. 
 But from 4th to the 5th is only half a tone. 
 From the 5th to the 6th is a whole tone. 
 From the 6th to the 7th is a whole tone. 
 From the 7th to the 8th is only half a tone. 
 
 In this seeming inequality of the two half tone intervals, all the beauty, 
 all the infinite variety of modulation exists, for on whatever note the 
 dominant is fixed, the same proportion is kept up, the same half tones are 
 found by all the whole tones being divided by the flats and sharps. 
 
 Perhaps nature's indulgence has been greater in allowing us this octave 
 than in anything else, for we know, for we are sure, that the octave is a 
 divine privilege, that it exists in the upper world, and that we are allowed 
 to participate in it. It shows that we are immortal beings, and that 
 another world exists to which we are to be united. 
 
 The same rule applies to colours, for they are inexhaustible, and we 
 know at every instant in the light they come to us from the happier world 
 where such abstractions exist. We are sure that it must be a positive 
 world, as the law of harmony is positive, and indeed we may state with 
 comparative assurance that the Divine Author has bestowed on us 
 unchangeable and eternal links in colours and sounds. 
 
 Of the two or three short tales which Severn wrote, the 
 only one among the Severn MSS. is the short ghost-story 
 entitled 'The Pale Bride.' After he had written it, the 
 subject took great hold of his imagination, and mentally 
 haunted him for a long space of time. He projected 
 several pictures in illustration of the more striking episodes ; 
 for example, the first time that the eyes of the mysterious 
 stranger looked on her lover with the glassy stare of death— 
 when he saw her, when he had gone abroad for his homeward 
 voyage, looking at the sea from the spot where he had first 
 seen her, in the same dress, with the same averted face, in 
 the same attitude — and when, the lover's dead body having 
 been thrown from the raft by the few survivors of the 
 shipwreck, "the silent woman" leaps overboard to the 
 
SEVERN'S STORY: 'TEE PALE BRIDE: 2"1 
 
 "place where it disappeared, and rises no more. Eeaders 
 who remember the incidents of Severn's first voyage to 
 Italy, will note that the ship in ' The Pale Bride ' has the 
 .same name as the schooner in which he and Keats sailed. 
 
 THE PALE BRIDE. 
 
 [In the possession of a Devonshire family at Plymouth there is the 
 following journal of Mr. Woolley's voyage to Barbadoes, in search of a 
 property which was nearly lost to him, and which he finally recovered, 
 though not to enjoy. We are now allowed to print it.] 
 
 December 1st, 1793. — I have to-day begun to prepare for my long and 
 ■doubtful voyage in search of the Barbadoes estate of my uncle Woolley, 
 and have just heard that he did leave some kind of will ; at all events 
 there cannot be a doubt that I am his only heir. I have enquired and 
 settled the price of the voyage, which is £75 ; and I have been twice with 
 my solicitor, Mr. James Price, who assured me I can never succeed to the 
 estate or possess it unless I go at once to Barbadoes. This is a hard task 
 sA present, as I have had to give up my little shop and my carpenter- 
 trade and sink down to an idler's, but God's will be done. My father and 
 mother implore me to do it, my friends wish it, and the lawyers insist on 
 it, so what can I do but prepare, yet I do it with a drag. 
 
 December 2nd. — Yesterday as I could not go to see my poor Mary once, 
 I have determined to see her twice to-day. I found her pale and ill, and 
 for her I would waive all going, save that she insists on my going, and 
 secretly in my ear to-day whispered that she would go with me — that we 
 could be married at once, but that her father, she is sure, would not 
 consent on account of her health. I was so struck with this charming 
 appeal, that it seemed to make my voyage shorter and my success certain, 
 and I lost not a moment in finding Dr. Magnus, and making sure of his 
 consent to let his daughter go. I found him returning home to dinner, 
 and made my earnest request to him, at which he turned pale and was 
 dumb. I represented to him our long and faithful acquaintanceship, his 
 liking for m;, and Mary's unfeigned attachment ; still, he shook his head. 
 I implored him to consent, when he sighed bitterly, and, grasping my 
 hand convulsively, said that his daughter's health would not bear it, that 
 ishe would die on the voyage, and, he added, " She is my only child, and I 
 live on the preservation of her life; she grows into the dear, dear 
 resemblance of her mother, and I live upon that resemblance, being my 
 dearest and only tie in this world. Forgive, forgive my weakness of 
 heart, but attend, and believe in my professional skill. As I felt that I 
 should be seemingly harsh in this sad opinion of Mary's health, I 
 yesterday called in Dr. Teats and Dr. Upton, who, I am grieved to 
 tell, more than confirmed my sad prognostic that the voyage would kill 
 Mary, and that here she has at least the chance of recovery." Of course, 
 I was now struck dumb in my turn, for all the doings of my life turned 
 
232 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEBN. 
 
 upon Mary being my wife ; but here was a long voyage, and an affair of a 
 year, and yet doubt in the separation: yet what could I say to this 
 excellent doctor and good father. I had not a word. We remained in 
 silent tears leaning on each other's shoulders, without words, yet figuring 
 all the worst disasters as we watched each other's tears dropping to the 
 ground. 0! each tear told me a history. Might I ever meet her 
 again ? 
 
 December 3rd. — All my property being sold for this voyage, my car- 
 penters shop let, there was no alternative, go I must and leave Mary 
 behind, all our planning upset, her health declining, and who knows but 
 through this — but I must proceed. 
 
 Just returned from seeing the ship Maria Crowther, Captain Walston, 
 who is to sail to-morrow night : all my luggage is just now going. 
 
 December &th. — I must go and hear again what dear Mary has to 
 propose, and if her father has made aDy show of consent, or even told her 
 of his decision. 
 
 10 o'clock. — Found my dearest sunk in grief, much changed, and unable 
 to speak. Her father had told her of the bad opinion of Dr. Yeats and 
 Dr. Upton as regards her strength and health for the voyage, and that she 
 would be sure to die, and that then he would die too. She told me also, 
 in floods of tears, of her father describing again and again my attempt to 
 save her mother from drowning, how near I was to it, and that he had 
 ever since regarded me as his son. 
 
 My Mary fainted with anguish. She looked so beautiful even in her 
 paleness, and I longed to open with kisses those dear eyes that were 
 covered with the long eyelashes heavy with tears. Dr. Magnus came in 
 at the moment and helped to restore her to herself, but it was only to 
 greater grief. Yet he reasoned so well, he tried to shorten the voyage by 
 so many incidents of good fortune ; then he represented the Barbadoes 
 property as giving her a carriage, with a crest with his three boars' heads 
 and my saw upon it, till trembling Mary looked up and smiled. He 
 assured her of her quick recovery if she would remain quiet and go to 
 Mount Edgcumbe, where her uncle was village schoolmaster, and so she 
 would have a complete change, and Lady Mount Edgcumbe would look 
 kiDdly after her. 
 
 All this time the slenderness of all our means convinced me that there 
 was no putting off my voyage, for ruin stared me in the face if I remained 
 long idle. We had not at first looked at this event all round and round, 
 and did not see anything but our fond attachment, she seventeen, and I 
 only twenty-one. But now the whole weight of woe came plump upon us. 
 " Coming events cast their shadows before," and the reverse of the sunny 
 picture now turned our eyes inward: but there was no alternative. I 
 went home at two o'clock to prepare for my departure. 
 
 December 5th. — My father and mother are in joy that I am really going,, 
 for they seemed to sink at the thought even of delay, much less staying. 
 They have put me on my duty as a son, for by the acquisition of this pro- 
 perty they hope to live after all their cares in tranquil decline, with no. 
 
THE PALE BRIDE: 233 
 
 thoughts of money troubles such as are now shortening their lives. Ah ! 
 how I feel the painful truth of this ; how well I knew that they had 
 expended their last pound to provide for rne ; and that Dr. Magnus could 
 but barely afford them a meal if they should chance to want. 
 
 5 o'clock. — Dragged my steps to have a last glimpse of Mary, and was 
 astonished to see how she had picked up, and how cheerfully she received 
 me. But as her tears dropt on my hand I felt them scalding hot, and 
 trembled to think how much they differed from her smile, and how much 
 suffering she must be in — yet she continued cheerful and said " Goodbye, 
 Jamie," with even an earnest voice. And so I have left her for ever. For 
 ever, do I say ? and why? I cannot tell, but the weight of her fate hangs 
 on me so heavily that I cannot think of it. I seem to have killed her by 
 going. 
 
 7 o'clock at night. — On board, in a gloomy, threatening night. The 
 Captain very kind, and indeed all the passengers, of whom there are 
 seventeen. How miserable and forlornly I hear the sea beat against the 
 ship's side where I am preparing to sleep. ! that I could open this port- 
 hole and let in my Mary like a spirit to cheer me again with that last dear 
 smile. To bed, but not to sleep. 
 
 All the dreary, never-ending night I was listening to dreary waves that 
 were taking me from my dearest. I arose, and by the dim lamp write 
 this, but sea-sickness begins to torment me. 
 
 December 6th. — The dawning light, for which I so longed, brings me no 
 consolation. My sickness, though abating, leaves me no comfort, for I 
 see my dear Mary at every turn of my head, whether I look up or down, 
 right or left, there she is and always in tearful suffering. 
 
 10 o'clock. — I crawled up on deck, where I found many persons 
 assembled, and they all looked towards me except one lady, whose dress 
 and whose figure seemed to me like Mary. Surely that is her bonnet 
 which I gave her last year? That gown with the violet pattern is 
 like hers, and that gloved hand, whose can it be to be so like hers? 
 I sank down with the bewilderment, and prayed for the well-being 
 of Mary. 
 
 Again I raised my head, and there was her exact image, except that I 
 could not see her face. I tried, but her position prevented me. Yet as 
 she leaned her head upon her hand, the attitude was so like Mary's that I 
 became frantic. I jumped up and strode over to the ship's side, where I 
 should have fallen into the sea had not a sailor caught hold of me, but in 
 the effort, although it was but a momentary glance, I caught the lady's 
 eye. It was hers, out it was Death's. I sank again into the sailor's arms. 
 I am now somewhat recovered, and those deal' eyes bend over me. At 
 times she has me by the hand, but how came she here ? Is it she ? 
 Where is her father ? — all which I would have asked, but I seemed choked 
 with agitation. Can it be her ? but can I doubt it ? Who else could be 
 so like herself. My breath still fails me. I have not words to ask how 
 she came, but inwardly I look at her and think that she must have stolen 
 away to the ship in the last extremity, and then waited concealed until 
 
234 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 we actually sailed. Now we are passing " Land's End," of which I can 
 believe in the identity, but I cannot believe in my dear Mary's. There is 
 some inexpressible thing which makes us unlike each other, yet I ami 
 unchanged, these hands and this pen are mine, there is my trunk with my 
 name on it, and here is my journal up to December 6th. I tremble to 
 behold her again, and why ? My knees tremble as I rise to go on deck, 
 but I must see that dear object. 
 
 12 o'clock. — I found her looking on the sea in the same attitude as when 
 I saw her at first ; with the same bonnet and same dress ; and in the 
 same place. Will she look at me? Her gloved hand hanging down, 1 
 made an effort to touch it, and I think I caught her glance, but of this I 
 am in doubt. I said, " Are you not my dear Mary ? " and I listened 
 for her soft voice, but there was no reply. Yet I felt one finger tonch my 
 hand ; it was her little finger. Again I asked how she was thus by my 
 side, she pointed the other hand (which was resting on the ship's side) to 
 the last sight of land, and groaned. Ah ! what a groan was that, and how 
 removed from the last cheerful smile I got in her father's house. We 
 remained unable to speak. Such was the strain of our suspended breath, 
 that the waves seemed to answer to my palpitation. I was roused at last 
 by the bell sounding for dinner. Everybody about rose hurriedly, and the 
 vision of my Molly gently too, and so she followed them and I her. She 
 glided down the cabin stairs, and I fell in following her ; the cabin boy 
 helped me up, and when I got to the table I found her by my side. I 
 watched her eating, for I was more and more afraid, and had not power to 
 offer her anything. The steward put some roast beef before her, but she 
 only took one morsel of bread and sipped some water. She did not answer 
 the steward except with a movement of her head. In my wonderment I 
 did not touch a bit of dinner, my appetite was gone as though I never had 
 it. She glided away with the company, and after awhile I called up 
 courage to follow her. On the deck I found her sitting in the same place, 
 in the same attitude, looking at the waves. The sea increased, the wind 
 was high, and I head the distant thunder. I shrank from my watching 
 position, on the approach of sea-sickness again. The cabin boy came to 
 help me, for I was very ill, and they had to carry me to my berth. For 
 hours and hours I was sick to death, and wished to die. At midnight, 
 when the storm was a little hushed, and I was about to sink into restless 
 sleep, I turned suddenly round, and who should be before me but my dear 
 Mary. In the dim light the figure was uncertain, though I could see the 
 eyes glisten. I strove to move nearer to her, and was surprised to find she 
 was less visible. She waved her hand gently over me. I felt an involun- 
 tary inclination to sleep. I slept till the broad daylight, and then I awoke 
 and perceived her still watching me like the polar star. I spoke, but there 
 was no reply. She put her fingers to her lips, and I felt my tongue as it 
 were paralyzed in my mouth. What can this be ? am I ill or mad ? or 
 can this be a reality? — but 'tis so wonderful I'll write it down that at a 
 future time I may believe it myself. So I turned over to get my journal, 
 and in the instant she had vanished. Certainly I was not looking toward* 
 
' THE PALE BRIBE: 225 
 
 •the door, so I cannot say if she went out of it. I reflected on all this 
 strange fact, if fact it was, and could not understand it. I found myself 
 unable to rise and my pulse was fevered. I saw the Captain come to me 
 and ask me questions, which I was unable to answer, and then the doctor, 
 and then I saw him take out his lancet, and after this I swooned. 
 
 December Uth. — A week, I find, has passed, and I have been insensible 
 during, the whole time from lightheadedness and fever of mind as well 
 as body. They lifted me up, but I was unable to stand, and so I was 
 lifted back again, and to give me air they opened the port-hole, through 
 which on the first night I longed to receive the spirit of Mary. But the 
 light was too great for my weakened sight, so I turned away from it, and 
 I soon perceived that it became dim and I was afraid to look, but after 
 many attempts I did and beheld — what ! the spirit of my love. She 
 reclined partly within and partly without the doorway. Her eyes were 
 bare, and showed me death in so mysterious a form that I know not how 
 to write it. The dusk had hid this most unearthly look. They seemed 
 like eyes that had never been closed in death, though they were ghastly 
 with a death-like vacancy. I saw them but an instant, and when I looked 
 again it was only on the violet gown, which I could perceive was blowing 
 in the wind. I felt its undulations pass over me, and I could see the last 
 violet on the stairs, when I sunk again in my weakness and amazement, 
 and could not reason on the reality or the dream, or if I was really on the 
 sea. 
 
 December 15£&. — The Captain and a sailor very kindly got me up on 
 deck, and I was placed on a bed and begun to revive and be like myself; 
 yet I hadn't strength to raise myself or turn round, but the happy feeling 
 of returning health and consciousness was delightful. The sea breeze was 
 fanning me and playing on my wan cheek, when, in my enjoyment, I 
 perceived a hand advancing on my pillow, but I had not strength to look 
 up and bank to see the face, yet the hand touched my cheek and was 
 deadly cold. The touch gave me artificial life, and I forced my head up 
 and saw the glistening eyes and the pale face of what I thought my own 
 Mary, but oh! how changed, how pointed her chin, how sunken her 
 cheeks, and how slim the finger on her lip, which trembled with weakness. 
 She evidently made signs to me to be silent and secret, and what would I 
 not do to have her beside me. 
 
 She leant on my pillow, and I could perceive that her elbow made no 
 impression on it. Her gentle breath passed over me in the wintry air, 
 and I tried to stop it with mine. The sun shone, and I could see the 
 pretty meeting of our breaths, but hers was clearer and whiter than the 
 sun-beams. To-day they gave me food, and I had some appetite, though 
 not of the craving kind, and I gained strength by little and little. 
 
 December 11th. — The Captain helps me to walk, and the Silent Lady 
 (as he calls my Mary) walks on my other side. He asked me if she was 
 dumb, as he believed no one had heard her speak, and if I was related to 
 her. I was afraid to answer these questions as the finger on the lip was 
 before my eyes, yet from day to day my uneasiness has abated, and 
 
236 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVESX. 
 
 whatever my fate I felt the more reconciled to it. I think my Mary may 
 possibly be even my guardian angel. 
 
 At all events, I feel prohibited from talking about her, she has inspired 
 me with a silent reverence. I whisper to myself that she may be Mary's 
 ghost, but I have nothing to decide me one way or the other. We walk 
 up and down and spiritually understand each other. Her eyes converse 
 with mine ; but, ! if they should ever shine without that mysterious- 
 veil as of shadow — but let me not try to write it, or I shall die. 
 
 December 22nd.— ***** 
 (There are many entries omitted intentionally, as they are much the same.) 
 
 January 1st. — Here is New Year's Day, and nothing new to write 
 down. My unearthly companion is still with me, but I have got to be 
 no longer afraid of watching her. What all this will end in I cannot tell. 
 Will she meet me in Barbadoes like herself, will she be really my Mary — 
 am I in a dream ? and shall I wake up to find her a substance ? It may 
 be that the sea air has spiritualized her dear body, and that the mortality 
 will come, to her again when her feet touch the 'terra firma,' and she 
 breathes the air of land. This fatal dream seems to have no end, and yet 
 it must, and I'll believe that providence intends my happiness, but now 
 puts me to the test of patience, prudence and forbearance. I must bide 
 my time. 
 
 January l&th. — A little incident has made me fall back into my first 
 fears. Last night, as we were walking on deck in the light of the rising 
 full moon, my mournful companion happened to be" before me, and had 
 actually turned round to look at me, and see, as I supposed, if I were 
 following her. The large full moon was behind her, when to my horror I 
 could see its form through her, and it illuminated the back of her head, 
 and showed me once again those death-like eyes. I sunk down at the sight, 
 and although I closed my eyes that I might not see hers again and die, 
 yet even then I could see the eyes faintly, and dared not open mine — not 
 even when I felt her cold dead hand pass over them. How should I ever 
 get up and recover myself, and what was to follow ? Suddenly a dozen" 
 voices cried out, " Land, land," and every one rushed on deck. In my 
 amazement I looked round, and found my visionary companion leaning on 
 my shoulder. 
 
 We soon neared land, and all was bustle. The confusion of boats, 
 voices, waves, and distant hubbub turned my head. I looked about and 
 found that my companion was nowhere visible. I sought through the 
 ship, waited until every one had left, and then alone, with my baggage 
 following, I proceeded to the Barbadoes Custom House. 
 
 January 25th. — Here I am, with everything settled. My law business 
 was easy, and although it required my presence, yet it was soon done, and 
 I had the happiness to be the possessor of ninety thousand pounds in 
 money, and more than half that sum in local property. 
 
 This increased my anxiety to return to my anxious parents and my 
 dear Mary. Three weeks had I passed, and no sign of her or her spirit 
 on land. My eye looked everywhere for her, but looked in vain. 
 
SEVERN'S NOVEL: 'THE DEAD HAND.' 237 
 
 February 14th, — My property all arranged, I proceeded to embark again 
 in the Maria Crowther, and felt a more substantial man, aye, and equal 
 to meeting ghosts. The passengers were arriving on board, when a veiled 
 lady passed me, and it at once struct me that she was my former 
 mysterious companion. This time the Captain was impressed, and 
 demanded of her if she was a regularly passed passenger, and her fare paid. 
 She answered not, but produced a paper signed, which satisfied him, and I 
 saw him bow to her, his eyes downcast, yet following as much as they 
 dared. • 
 
 February 15th. — In the morning I saw her sitting on the deck, and 
 looking on the sea in the same gown, the same attitude, and the same 
 place. We resumed our acquaintanceship silently. But at last I began 
 to weary of, as well as dread, this apparition of my love, yet without one 
 charm of my dear Mary, for the face had death in its silent horror, and 
 the eyes something more, let, as I say, we resumed our companionship 
 and our silent conversation, though I confess I had less and less inclina- 
 tion to speak. My days are passing in perpetual gloom " Here the 
 
 journal breaks off, and the reader must follow the account of Dr. Magnus. 
 His daughter died on the 2nd of December, suddenly, of paroxysm of the 
 heart, and was buried at Plymouth. 
 
 The ship in which James Woolley was returning was wrecked off the 
 Bahama Islands. The Captain, three sailors, and two of the passengers 
 were saved. He was one of the two, the silent lady the other. But ere 
 long he died of hunger and thirst, and when the castaways proceeded to 
 throw the body into the sea, the silent lady jumped from the raft after it, 
 and sank, never to rise. All the property was made over to old Mr. and 
 Mrs. Woolley, and they lived to a great age. They often referred to 
 this very journal which we now print, and which was singularly preserved 
 by the Captain's supposing it of value as appertaining to the Woolley estate. 
 
 The historical romance, called at 'first ' The Dead Hand ' 
 and afterwards 'Love's Triumvirate,' was begun, as has 
 already been noted, at an early date, and long before its 
 author's departure from Italy, though it was not finished till 
 the summer of 1863, two years after his return to Koine. 
 It is the only literary composition by Severn — apart from 
 his autobiographical reminiscences — which has any claim 
 to serious consideration. In length it fully equals the 
 ordinary three-volume novel. The plot is a sufficiently 
 good, if not a strikingly original one, and the incidents 
 are fairly well evolved and of continuous interest. No part 
 ■of the romance lends itself to excerption, so it would be 
 useless to quote a chapter, or even portions of chapters. 
 
 The story opens at the time of the Inquisition in Eome, 
 
238 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVEEN. 
 
 and when the severest search was made for heretical books. 
 One day, at the customs-office, a box is opened, which 
 apparently contains nothing save a human hand. A certain 
 Padre Ambrosio orders the box to be nailed up again, and 
 then takes it away with him ; in the privacy of his own 
 apartment he reopens it, and finds a long narrative in MS. 
 He reads this carefully, and ultimately, instead of making 
 the matter known to the higher authorities of the Inquisition,, 
 replaces the MS. in the box beside the shrivelled hand, and 
 sends the package to the address in Saxony which he had 
 found duly indicated. 
 
 So much for the prologue. The story, as set forth in the 
 MS. discovered by Padre Ambrosio, follows in Chapter II. 
 In this chapter the reader is introduced to two young 
 officers, Herman and Gabriel, in the army of Charles the- 
 Fifth, who are discussing the absorbing topic of the time r 
 the Keformation, and incidentally their own prospects. 
 Gabriel is indifferent to the great cause so long as all goes- 
 well with his own fortunes: Herman is a determined 
 enthusiast. The scene is changed in the following chapter 
 to the interior of a convent in the Campo Vaccino at Rome. 
 There the Abbess, Donna Chiara, a bigot, rigorously rules- 
 twelve nuns, one or two of whom, nevertheless, are aware of 
 the great changes which are taking place in that outer 
 world of whose sinful doings they are supposed to know 
 so little. These would-be rebels determine to escape from 
 .Donna Chiara's tyranny. By a daring, and what would be 
 now-a-days an impossible ruse, they attract the attention of 
 two young German officers, who chance to be in Borne on 
 a mission, and to be passing by the convent ; almost needless- 
 to say, the young officers are Herman and Gabriel. But 
 the reader does not reach the end of this episode in 
 Chapter IV., where, instead, he is conducted to the house- 
 of the great painter, Titian, then with his daughter 
 residing in Borne. Some of Titian's pictures are described,, 
 particularly his 'Danse,' so much admired by Michel 
 Angelo. It happens that the famous artist's daughter 
 (whom Severn throughout calls " Signora Titian," strange 
 
the dead hand: 230 
 
 as the mistake may seem for an Anglo-Italian) has a friend 
 in the conventof the Abbess Donna Chiara ; and one day, 
 after a visit to her, she returns to find that the two young 
 German officers have come to her father's studio to see his 
 portrait of the Emperor Charles. Titian asks her about 
 her friend, and Herman overhears and is deeply interested 
 in her reply. Finding her visitors sympathetic, she speaks 
 strongly against the imprisonment of Sister Teresa, contrary 
 to the promise made when she entered the convent ; and, 
 in her narrative, includes Sister Teresa's great friend, Sister 
 Clara Colonna. She has no portrait of the former, but 
 shows a miniature of Sister Clara to Herman, who is startled 
 to recognise the features of one whom he had met a year 
 ago, and had straightway fallen in love with. 
 
 Next day " Signora Titian " visits Teresa again, and 
 learns that, in her efforts to attract the attention of the 
 German officers whom she had seen passing, she had 
 recognised a young noble who had admired her before her 
 seclusion, though she had had no intercourse with him. This, 
 of course, is Gabriel. It is ultimately arranged that Teresa 
 and Clara attempt to escape by one of the windows in the 
 garden of the convent, one which Teresa knows to be 
 insecure. When the time is at hand, the two young men 
 take up their position under the Arch of Titus and wait ; 
 but, suspecting that they are watched, they feign intoxica- 
 tion. As a matter of fact the Padre Ambrosio and the 
 Abbess have had their suspicions aroused, though the latter 
 is too much occupied with Lady Vittoria Colonna, who is 
 a guest at the convent, pending her departure for Viterbo, 
 to pay much extra heed to her nuns. Herman and Gabriel 
 have reluctantly to leave with their object unfulfilled. 
 Meanwhile Herman has fraternised with an Italian novelist, 
 an unconventional scribe, who writes his novelle only from 
 actual incidents witnessed by himself, and, when subjects fail 
 him, does not hesitate " to provoke people to an episode " 
 as he euphemistically puts it. From this individual 
 Herman learns much that confirms him in his devotion to 
 the cause of the Reformation. 
 
240 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 In the tenth chapter there is a description of a grand 
 tournament in the Colosseum. Herman at last enters the 
 lists, and challenges a Eoman noble, whom he vanquishes 
 only to discover that he is the brother of Sister Teresa. 
 They fraternise forthwith, and Count Orsini is obligingly 
 communicative. He explains why his sister was punished 
 by immurement in the convent ; warns his companion about 
 the espionage that everywhere prevails ; and incidentally 
 mentions that two implicated individuals (how or why 
 implicated is not very clear) are to be burned next day 
 in the Piazza di San Claudio. Thither (in Chapter XL) 
 Herman goes on the morrow. Of the two condemned un- 
 fortunates one is an Italian and the other a German ; and 
 in the latter he recognises his cousin, who had been for 
 five years studying at the Eoman College. Herman is in 
 time to save his cousin's life, by an appeal to one of the 
 Emperor's high officials who is present, though he is unable 
 to get a reprieve for the Italian, who suffers death at the 
 stake. The reprieved cousin is left in prison, while in 
 Chapter XII. Herman and Gabriel plan anew the rescue of 
 the fair nuns. When all is ready they go the Colosseum 
 at sundown and wait in the dusk till the moon has risen, 
 when they move further into the darkness near the walls 
 of the convent garden. They descry the nuns, but Donnas 
 Teresa and Clara indicate their inability to help them- 
 selves, though they can do so only by gestures. The rescue 
 has again to be postponed. Meanwhile the cousin has, 
 owing to the Emperor's request, been set at liberty. He 
 joins Herman" and Gabriel, and offers to assist them in 
 carrying off the imprisoned ladies by force. This, however, 
 is too great a risk for them. There the three com- 
 panions go to the catacombs — mainly so as to give the 
 author an opportunity to describe these subterranean 
 haunts of the refugees and conspirators and suspicious 
 characters of Eome, as, at the period in question, the cata- 
 combs were. Ultimately it is arranged that the cousin, 
 who is a young priest of noble family, and Count Orsini, 
 are to deceive the abbess during a nocturnal ceremony in 
 
THE DEAD HAND.' 241 
 
 the Church of the Via Crucis. It is a special occasion, and 
 the abbess and nuns are preoccupied with the picturesque 
 and strange procession by candlelight which moves before 
 them. Count Orsini tries to see his sister, but she is not 
 visible. It is clear to him that a closer watch than 
 ever is kept upon Teresa, and he determines to give 
 Herman and Gabriel all the assistance he can for her 
 rescue. Even Don Gregorio, the priestly cousin, with an 
 engaging gallantry at variance with his vows and pro- 
 fession, offers to become a practical partner in the escapade. 
 Indeed it is he who, in company with the two officers, 
 make the new attempt. They have rope-ladders, duly con- 
 cealed, and hope for success; but when they draw near, 
 they perceive three stalwart young priests forming a night- 
 watch just outside the convent. Don Gregorio advances 
 alone, gets into pious conversation with the priests, and 
 manages to allure them inside the chapel of the convent. 
 Herman and Gabriel make the most of their opportunity. 
 Having mounted the ancient wall and descended into the 
 garden, they succeed in gaining the window of the room 
 where Teresa is kept. When they have wrenched away 
 the feeble iron bars, they discover that Clara is there also. 
 The two nuns are hurriedly helped to descend, and are then 
 clad in the disguising robes which their rescuers brought 
 with them; whereafter, the outward wall having been 
 ■cleared, all four at last safely reach the deserted Forum. 
 Here, however, Clara's excitement overcomes her ; and 
 she faints. The ensuing chapter abruptly leaves the 
 fortunes of the lovers. The author describes Titian in his 
 studio at the Vatican, before his portrait of Pope Paul III. 
 The painting is put out to dry in the sunshine, and the 
 passers by all kneel reverentially before it, notwithstanding 
 its "ferocious look." Then follow some reflections and 
 moralisings. In the seventeenth chapter we meet again 
 the peripatetic Roman novelist, who, delighted with having 
 got so many " bits " for his next story from Herman, tries 
 to provoke him into " odd courses ; among others, to set 
 fire to the convent, so as to give him (this gay mannerist) 
 
 E 
 
242 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 an opportunity to describe from the life the picturesque 
 destruction of a convent by Greek Fire." He, however, 
 assures Herman that he has the power to extinguish the 
 flames readily — " at least sufficiently to save the younger 
 nuns." This, it must be explained, occurs before the 
 incident of the escape of the nuns. 
 
 There is now a return to this event. The novelist is 
 in the Church by the Via Sacra, when he hears a tumult 
 without, followed by cries indicating that nuns are being 
 carried away. There is a wild commotion, and there would 
 be a stampede, did not the abbess enter with her nuns 
 (less two), and at the same time order the guards to 
 surround the exits and let no one pass. But all precautions, 
 are too late. Gabriel has helped Teresa to the spot where- 
 the horses had been left, and in a few seconds he and she 
 are well away on the lonely road leading from the western 
 walls of Eome to Ostia. But Herman, in endeavouring to> 
 follow with the unconscious Clara, stumbles over a recently 
 excavated antique group and falls into the gaping hole in 
 the ground, with the result that he is stunned, and poor 
 Clara's leg is broken. Before he can resume his effort to 
 escape, the guards have found that their birds had flown ; 
 and in a few minutes the whole mob of soldiers, priests,, 
 and excited people bears down upon the unfortunates, who 
 are soon visible in the torchlight. Herman attempts to 
 defend himself but is soon overpowered, while Clara is 
 carried back to the convent in a half-dying condition,, 
 notwithstanding the singularly aesthetic pleasure of the 
 convent-doctor, who happens to be on the spot, and does 
 not wish the fair nun to be removed, " as she is in such a 
 fine attitude." 
 
 In the next chapter Clara is described as being in agony, 
 and almost near death. " Signora Titian " has visited her, 
 and has obtained permission for the Emperor's surgeon to 
 attend and do what he can for the broken limb ; yet she is 
 not at ease, for she notices a peculiar and stern expression 
 on the face of the bigoted abbess. When the bone has 
 been set, and all are gone, the nuns tenderly carry Clara 
 
' TEE BEAD HAND.' 243 
 
 back to her cell, though the oldest sister horrifies her by 
 whisperingly warning her that she had better die at once, 
 as it is the abbess's intention to follow the old-time punish- 
 ment, and to have her bricked up, to die in starvation and 
 misery. Finally this awful news comes to the ears of 
 " Signora Titian," who, unable to credit it, confides in her 
 father, who, however, confirms the rumour and adds that 
 nothing can be done. The unfortunate girl is not even to 
 be allowed to take farewell of her brother. Everything is 
 done to save her, but without avail ; and the several plots 
 for rescue all fall through. Even the motive-hunting Roman 
 novelist haunts the neighbourhood, and tries to persuade 
 the priests of the convent to " some romantic extremity." 
 Poor Clara is in horror and despair, though a faint gleam 
 of hope comes to her after a visit from the Padre Ambrosio. 
 With outward severity he denounces her as a heretic and 
 evil-doer, but she imagines she sees a pitying and even 
 meaning look in his eyes as, unseen, he slips a sealed paper 
 into her hand. 
 
 The narrative of Gabriel and Teresa is now taken up. 
 They reached Ostia, and hoped to find a vessel about to 
 sail from Eiumicino ; but were disappointed. Gabriel bribes 
 a peasant woman to sell her festal dress, and with this 
 Teresa disguises herself in the semblance of a charming 
 contadina. He too disguises himself as a peasant, and keeps 
 away from Teresa, while, to still further avert suspicion 
 from the guards at Ostia, he chops wood all day in the 
 neighbouring pine forest of Eusano, whither Teresa carries 
 him his dinner at noon. But ere long she succumbs to 
 the malarious air that ever broods around Ostia, and, in 
 order to save her life, Gabriel goes to Eome, disguised as 
 a peasant, so as to procure the services of a doctor. He 
 seeks " Signora Titian," who refuses to apply to the Court 
 Doctor, and at the same time tells him of the sad fate 
 hanging over Donna Clara. But at last he finds a doctor 
 willing to accompany him. The physician, however, is 
 suspicious that Teresa is no contadina, though he does not 
 seem to have detected Gabriel for all his German accent 
 
 r2 
 
244 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 and ignorance of the vernacular ; at any rate he confides 
 to him that he believes the invalid is none other than the 
 •escaped nun, for whose capture a large reward has been 
 offered. It is now Gabriel's turn to be suspicious. He 
 follows the doctor, and sees him speak to the Papal police 
 at Ostia. He resumes his former disguise as a woodcutter, 
 and he manages to mislead the doctor a little way into 
 the forest. The man is jubilant at his discovery and in- 
 cautiously betrays himself, so without more ado Gabriel 
 raises his axe and cuts him down. In great fear that all 
 is lost, he is returning to the cottage for what may be a 
 last glimpse of Teresa, when, in the far roadstead, he 
 descries a vessel, and one evidently getting ready to depart. 
 With all haste he gains the cottage, takes Teresa in his 
 arms, and places her on the cottager's donkey. By a short 
 cut across the great swamp the refugees gain the shore 
 while the police are still searching in an opposite direction, 
 and succeed in getting safely aboard the vessel, whose 
 sails are already set and anchor up. 
 
 The next chapter is mainly devoted to the ecclesiastical 
 trial of Donna Clara. Ultimately she is condemned to be 
 bricked up alive, with a small supply of bread and water, 
 and a single wick-light. Her one hope now is in the 
 Emperor's doctor, of whom she has begged a last favour, 
 to which he has assented. The chapter that follows is 
 somewhat wearisomely occupied with the sayings and 
 doings of the irrepressible Eoman novelist; and it is a 
 Telief in the next again to follow the fortunes of Gabriel 
 and Teresa. Just as the captain was about to lay-to for 
 some late cargo which he saw arriving, Gabriel noticed a 
 commotion at the spot where he had slain the treacherous 
 doctor, and soon after caught sight of his and the nun's 
 pursuers making for the shore. He at once told the 
 ■captain a different version of his story, and offered him a 
 heavy bribe to sail away at once ; an offer which the mariner 
 readily accepts, and gives prompt orders accordingly. 
 
 Back again, in another chapter, to the unfortunate Clara, 
 who is now calmly preparing to undergo her doom. The 
 
THE DEAD HAND.' 245 
 
 Emperor's doctor, in saying farewell, admits that he has 
 told her story to the vagrant novelist ; whereat she begs 
 him to secure the MS. at any price, and then secretly 
 whispers some words in his ear. She then says good-bye 
 to Titian's daughter, and sends a " dying message " to 
 her brother. It now appears that " Signora Titian " was. 
 interested in Donna Clara only because the nun was her 
 protegee ; once sentenced to be immured, Clara ceased to be- 
 interesting ! The lady therefore looks about for some one 
 else, and ends by " adopting " the novelist, with whose story 
 of ' The Unfortunate Nun ' she is so delighted that she 
 promises to show it to the great Aretino, then on his way 
 to Rome. 
 
 There is an abrupt departure from the main stream of 
 narrative in the next chapter, which describes the persecu- 
 tion of the Reformers in the north of Italy, their protection 
 by the intrepid Duchess of Ferrara, and the departure 
 for JFerrara of Titian and his daughter. But after this 
 unnecessary interlude we are taken back to the convent, 
 and to the horrible ceremony of the walling up of the 
 doomed nun. When the bricklayer has almost finished 
 his work, Clara's sister-nuns take farewell of her, and then 
 the last sacraments are administered, while from the 
 organ in the church is heard the solemn strain of the 
 Be Profundis. The bread, water, and small lamp having 
 next been placed in the aperture, Donna Clara is then lose 
 to sight. 
 
 In the following chapter is set forth the attempt of three 
 pitying nuns to liberate their wretched sister. They have 
 to wait till near dawn, but at last they reach her cell. In 
 a short time they have removed some of the freshly- 
 mortared bricks, but they find Donna Clara already dead. 
 In their despair they do not hear the approach of the 
 vigilant abbess, who finds them in flagrante delicto, and 
 tells each that she is arrested. At the same time, Clara 
 being dead, she allows the body to be taken out and laid 
 upon the bed in the cell. The doctor is summoned, and 
 after his inspection he entreats the abbess to permit 
 
246 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 him to perform a solemn promise, namely to cut off 
 Clara's left hand. The abbess refuses, but has to yield 
 when he shows her the official authorisation. 
 
 The doctor next obtains the history of Clara as written 
 by the novelist, and this he encloses along with the severed 
 hand in an oaken box which he has prepared. Finally, he 
 places in it the last will and testament of the unfortunate 
 nun, and then, having made all secure, addresses it to 
 Herman in Saxony, whither that unlucky warrior had gone 
 when, at the instance of the Emperor, he was liberated from 
 prison. This was the box which Padre Ambrosio, as an 
 officer of the Inquisition, chanced to open ; and which, after 
 full consideration, he allowed to go to its destination. 
 
 Meanwhile Gabriel and Teresa have safely arrived in 
 Saxony, and it is they who, shortly before their marriage- 
 feast, receive the box intended for Herman, who has not 
 yet reached his home. When he does arrive, and in time 
 for the festival, he is amazed at the contents of the box, 
 but at last sees a meaning in the hand having been sent 
 to him. He becomes a godly dreamer, and ultimately a 
 devout Catholic. Faithful all his life to the memory of 
 Donna Clara, he spends his latter years among the noble 
 brotherhood of the monks of Monte Carona. 
 
 Thus ends the romance of ' The Dead Hand.' As will 
 readily be realised, it has enough matter to make a suc- 
 cessful novel. Unfortunately, the execution sadly lags 
 behind the conception, save in the purely descriptive and in- 
 cidental passages. For one thing, the author is maddeningly 
 indifferent in his use of his personages' names. " Herman " 
 is constantly made to do duty for " Gabriel," and vice versa ; 
 and equally indiscriminate is his use of " Teresa " and 
 " Clara," not to speak of occasional change to " Candida " 
 for either " Clara " or " Teresa " or both. " Signora 
 Titian " is the old friend of Clara, whom she never saw till 
 in the convent, as often as of Teresa. At the very time 
 when Herman is in the convent garden endeavouring to 
 escape with Teresa — no, Clara — he is also forgetfully repre- 
 sented as engaged in conversation with the Eoman novelist 
 
PROJECTED NOVEL: ' TEE LOST THRONE.' 247 
 
 before his- attempt at rescue; while the muddle is further 
 enhanced by the fact that this conversation takes place in 
 the church at the moment the worshippers are disturbed 
 by the shouting of the persons who had witnessed the 
 escape of the nuns with Herman and Gabriel. As if to 
 make confusion worse confounded, the hours of the vesper- 
 service and the escape do not correspond. 
 
 Yet, withal, there is enough in the novel to have made 
 success fairly sure, if some judicious friend had revised the 
 MS. for Severn. To the last he expected to make "a hit" 
 with it, though it is doubtful if it ever was submitted to 
 any English publisher. 
 
 In his Diaries he gives a summary of a new novel, to 
 be called 'The Lost Throne,' which he projected in the 
 summer of 1864. It was to be " founded on the incidents 
 of the life of the ex-King of Naples, particularly on the facts 
 within my own knowledge;" and the plot was "to turn 
 mainly on the dark designs of the Jesuits." If the romance 
 had been written as projected, its incongruities and im- 
 probabilities would have handicapped it too heavily to 
 make any success possible. 
 
2i8 LIFE OF JOSEPH BE VEEN. 
 
 CHAPTEE XI. 
 
 B< turn to Eome^Severn and Keats — Meeting with and letters from 
 Keats's sister, Mme. de Llanos — Letter from Geo. Keats's grandson — 
 Letters from Chas. Cowden Clarke — Variants of the Keats-miniature — 
 Letter from Alfred Domett — A strange Trelawny letter — Letters 
 from S. Kirkup — StraDge conduct at St. Peter's — An amusing letter — 
 Keats's Letters to Miss Brawne — Letters from J. T. Fields — Severn 
 and the ' Letters.' 
 
 It was, says Severn, one of the most thrilling moments in 
 his life when, after close on twenty years' absence from 
 Italy, he again saw Eome across the Campagna, a hazy 
 purple splatch in the distance. Formerly, he had slowly 
 approached it from Naples, in that long first drive in Italy 
 which he and Keats took together, one of them at least 
 looking to Eome as the Mecca where salvation was to be 
 found. Then, too, he was as poor in means as in reputation, 
 and only his buoyant temperament enabled him to face 
 confidently whatever hazards lay before him. Now he was 
 returning to the city where his true home was, which he 
 loved and knew better than that grimy London which was 
 his birthplace though not his real alma mater : going back 
 after a long and successful career, and to a post of honour 
 and influence. 
 
 " Imagine me, Joseph Severn, the lad who was so accustomed to ill 
 health and poverty: without social advantages, or even adequate training : 
 who left home one wretched unforgettable night, and more as an outcast 
 than as one going on an honourable venture : imagine me, now, in my 
 sixties, a successful artist who has his works in all the great collections in 
 England, and in no less than three Eoyal Private Galleries, going back to 
 the Eome where name and fortune first came to me, as the chosen 
 representative of the British Empire ! I am proud as well as grateful to 
 be British Consul at Eome : but I think I would gladly slip back forty 
 years, to be once again travelling to Italy with my beloved Keats, and 
 
AUTOGRAPH PORTRAIT. OP SEVERN (ceteU circa 27). 
 To face page 248. 
 
BE TURN TO ROME, 249 
 
 even to be in Eome tending him agaiD, for all the suffering and anxiety of 
 that bitter time. But the more I think of it the more thankful I am for 
 the eventful course of my life. What would our poor father have said 
 had he known that his 'little Joe' would one day be British Consul to the 
 Papal Dominion ? " 
 
 Elsewhere Severn records how, though he visited the 
 grave of Keats soon after his return and did so not only 
 "without pain but with a proud exultation," he never, from 
 the first days of his Consulship — or, indeed, from the time 
 of Keats's death — was able to pass, " without the throb as of 
 a wound at his heart," across the Piazza di Spagna from the 
 Via Due Macelli eastward, or down to it by the western side 
 of the Spanish Stairs. 
 
 " Here in Borne, as I write, I look back through forty years of worldly 
 changes to behold Keats's dear image again in memory. It seems as if he 
 should be living with me now, insomuch as I never could understand his 
 strange and contradictory death, his falling away so suddenly from health 
 and strength." 
 
 In the ' Adonais ' folio, again, he writes : 
 
 " Till the future dares 
 Forget the past." 
 
 " It has forgot the past, and half a century confirms the change. 
 Here in Borne, after this long interval, I am bewildered in trying to 
 reconcile the glowing fame of Keats with his cruel death and extinction, 
 for they belong to each other. To me it seemed at one time as though it 
 were swept away for ever. His own touching line which he wished to be 
 inscribed on his tomb, 'Here lies one whose name was writ in water? 
 gives the history of his sad fate but does not intimate the marvellous 
 changes that fifty years have brought about, or that the name ' writ in 
 water ' should now be written in the hearts and minds of all the lovers of 
 poetry and humanity. This was a 'consummation devoutly to be 
 wished,' but who ever thought it was to be accomplished, who ever saw 
 this bright spot on the trembling horizon, who ever thought that even the 
 party-organs which endeavoured to destroy him would at last cherish 
 his ashes, and make of his high achievement a jewel in the crown of 
 Poesy? 
 
 " But this marvellous metamorphosis was not so much the influence of 
 the Poet's immortal works as of the changes in the changing world, 
 sometimes for the worse, sometimes for the better, but always an 
 intellectual lottery in which the world delights. In this strange interval, 
 I seem to have passed some five hundred years, so varied are the events 
 and changes I have gone through, instead of having lived merely my 
 present eighty years. 
 
250 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 " Dwelling in the remembrance of my illustrious friend, I now sit down 
 in the enjoyment of a great victory for which I seem to have been living, 
 and which was in store for the few personal friends of the Poet. 
 
 " 'Twas in the year of the Eeform Bill, 1830, that I first perceived a 
 rustle of opinions, but not conjecturing for a moment that it would or 
 could call up the spirits of Shelley and Keats I did not venture to open 
 my eyes, as ten years had passed away in the darkness and oblivion of an 
 ungrateful world, when I was suddenly amazed at the announcement that 
 G-alignani in Paris was actually publishing the works of these obscure 
 poets. 
 
 " Shortly thereafter I received the edition with the portrait of Keats 
 «ngraved from my drawing. I was unprepared for this delight, and 
 prepared myself against disillusion by striving to disbelieve it, when 
 shortly after I was sought out at Rome by many of our younger 
 aristocracy, who then formed what was called "young England' and 
 was composed of young men of varied intellectual accomplishments, 
 particularly in poetry. As they were amongst the most distinguished 
 individuals of the day I felt honoured by the compliment- to the dead 
 poets, but it was to me a riddle, as the former persecution of the two 
 poets was almost confined to the aristocratical party of the Conservatives. 
 Then politics ruled the world even of literature ; for all was judged by the 
 political bias. I was a great sufferer, after the death of Keats, from the 
 scorn and sneers passed upon his memory, as he had been a Liberal. 
 Even the pathetic line on his tomb, ' Here lies one whose name was writ 
 in water,' was particularly made the object of ridicule. It was often 
 repeated to- me like a Pasquinade ' Here lies one whose name was writ in 
 water and his works in milk and water.' But I will not go back any 
 longer in calling up these scornful incidents, but rather try to account for 
 this great mental revolution. Perhaps the most striking part of this new 
 drama was the mysticism in religious opinions which now became 
 associated with Shelley's poetry, and I then for the first time beard him 
 named as the only religious poet of the age : whereas in his lifetime, 
 particularly when he mentioned me in his beautiful elegy on Keats, he 
 was denounced as a vile infidel ; and my friends, when they saw my name 
 in the ' Adonais,' wrote to me imploring me to give up all acquaintance 
 with this wicked man as it might ruin my career as an artist. Meantime, 
 this compliment which Shelley paid me has procured me the enduring 
 friendship of many distinguished men, and I may here particularise Lord 
 Houghton, who has written the admirable Life of Keats, a work greater 
 as it is the devotion of one poet to another, like that of Shelley to 
 
 Following the quotation, in the ' Adonais ' folio, 
 
 " To that high Capital where Kingly Death 
 Keeps his pale Court in beauty and decay 
 He came and bought with price of purest breath 
 A grave among the Eternal," * * * 
 
SEVERN AND KEATS. 251 
 
 Severn has a note substantially the same as a passage 
 which appeared in his article in the Atlantic Monthly. 
 
 " It only remains for me to speak of my return to Home in 1861, after 
 an absence of twenty years, and of the favourable change and the enlarge- 
 ment during the time of Keats's fame, — not as manifested by now editions 
 of his works, or by the contests of publishers about him, or by the way in 
 which most new works are illustrated with quotations from him, or by 
 the fact that some favourite lines of his have passed into proverbs, but by 
 the touching evidence of his silent grave. That grave which I can 
 remember as once the object of ridicule, has now become the poetic shrine 
 of the world's pilgrims who care and strive to live in the happy and 
 imaginative region of poetry. The head-stone, having twice sunk, owing 
 to its faulty foundation, has been twice renewed by loving strangers, and 
 each time, as I am informed, these strangers were Americans. Here they 
 do not strew flowers, as was the wont of olden times, but they pluck 
 everything that is green and living on the grave of the poet. The 
 custodian tells me, that notwithstanding all his pains in sowing and 
 planting he cannot ' meet the great consumption.' Latterly an English 
 lady, alarmed at the rapid disappearance of the verdure on and around the 
 grave, actually left an annual sum to renew it. When the Custode 
 complained to me of the continued thefts, and asked what he was to do, I 
 replied, ' Sow and plant twice as much ; extend the poet's domain ; for, 
 as it was so scanty during his short life, surely it ought to be yielded to 
 him two-fold in his grave.' " 
 
 In his Diary for 1861, also, Severn records his pleasure at 
 meeting Senora de Llanos with her husband, son, and two 
 daughters.* Her married daughter, too, was in Rome at 
 this time — her husband, Mr. Leopold Brockman, having an 
 ■appointment as chief engineer of the Eoman railways. Mr. 
 Brockman was shortly afterwards created a Count." f 
 
 For reasons which will become apparent later on, I have 
 ■decided to give here some letters of a much later period in 
 .Severn's life. Even among these there is no particular 
 need of chronological sequence : so I will print first three 
 or four dated in 1877, each of the first three having direct 
 •connection with Keats's sister, Senora de Llanos— who, it 
 may be added, visited Rome and saw Severn on more than 
 
 * Senora de Llanos' only son was named after her illustrious brother. 
 Senor John Keats de Llanos is still living in Spain. 
 
 t Senora de Llanos' eldest daughter was, as Contessa Brockman, one of 
 rthe models for Severn's picture of ' The Marriage of Cana,' painted in 
 1863. 
 
252 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 the one occasion just referred to.* Those who realise the 
 pathos underlying the dignity of this letter, and are 
 ignorant of the circumstances of Frances Keats's latter 
 days, will be glad to know that relief, though late, did come 
 to her in her need. It may be added that she survived her 
 eldest brother nearly seventy years. Her death happened 
 at Madrid, in 1889. 
 
 " 5, Calle de Lista, 
 
 " Barria di Salamanca, 
 
 "Madrid, July 27th [1877]. 
 " My dear Mr. Severn, 
 
 "Being anxious to hear of your well-being, I commissioned a 
 Spanish friend of ours, who is now in Rome, to pay you a visit on my 
 part. He tells me that he called upon you ; but had not the pleasure of 
 seeing you, as you were at the time taking your siesta. 
 
 " A short time since I received a letter from Mr. Buxton Forman, 
 informing me that he is now occupied in a work which has connection 
 with the life and poetry of my dear brother ; and be is anxious to identify 
 the people mentioned in Lord Houghton's 'Life and Letters,' vol. I., 
 page 228, whose names are not given. Of course I can give. him no 
 information on the subject, nor does it appear to me at all necessary. 
 There is no doubt that the lady therein mentioned was not Miss Brawne, 
 as she was not an East Indian, nor had she a grandfather living at the 
 time. 
 
 " Do you still continue living with your English friends, in peace and 
 tranquillity, your children well married, and prosperous, so that you have 
 only to care for your health, and maintain your old cheerfulness which is 
 more valuable than gold, and all the vanities it may procure ? Do you 
 still amuse yourself with your painting ? 
 
 " For ourselves we have unfortunately gone down in the world, and up 
 to a fourth floor. 
 
 " Unfortunately we lent our capital to Leopold, and all has disappeared. 
 He has been unoccupied for some time, and consequently much em- 
 barrassed. He is now, however, Director of the Railroad of Jerez and 
 Sanlucar, but as he has six children, and many debts to pay, he can give 
 us but very little assistance. Do you think you could obtain a pension 
 for me through Mr. Gladstone ? If it is not unpleasant to you, you might 
 make the request to him ; but on no account if you feel the least dislike to 
 ask him a favour. 
 
 " In one of the English papers a short time since I saw that the Queen 
 had granted a pension of £100 to each of the three great grandchildren of 
 De Foe. 
 
 * When ou her first visit to Rome, SeEora F. Keats de Llanos planted 
 two bay-trees beside her brother's grave. 
 
* 
 
KEATS' S SISTER, MME. DE LLANOS. 253 
 
 " How are Eleanor and Arthur? When you write remember us kindly 
 to them. 
 
 " Mr. Llanos and family join me in warmest wishes for your health and 
 happiness, and believe me to remain, 
 
 " Yours most sincerely, 
 
 " F. Keats de Llanos." 
 
 Before she wrote to Severn again, in the early autumn of 
 the same year, she received the following letter from an 
 unknown grand-nephew, Mr. John Gilmer Speed, the 
 grandson of George Keats : 
 
 " No. 35, Park Bow, New York City, 
 
 " July 29th, 1877. 
 " Beak Madam, 
 
 " When I say that I am a grandson of George Keats, I feel sure 
 that I forestall the necessity for an apology for addressing you. 
 
 " On account of recent publications in regard to John Keats, including 
 Haydon's Autobiography, and several newspaper articles, one of which I 
 send you by this mail — an unusual interest is excited regarding your 
 brother's history. Several of these articles have revived stories that it 
 would have been better never to have touched ; but having been written 
 about, I deem it were well that they should be truthfully told. In 
 Haydon's Autobiography he says that during Keats's last year he was 
 nearly always under the influence of strong drink, and that his spirits rose 
 and sank according to his potations. Tou will notice in one of the letters, 
 in the newspaper I send you, that John Keats wrote his brother George, 
 that he, on account of Haydon's disregard for his moneyed obligations, 
 could never be friends with him again. It occurs to me, that in denying 
 this story — if it could be done on good authority — this remark about 
 Haydon could be used with effect, as showing that two years previous to 
 Keats's death the intimate relations of which Haydon speaks and through 
 which he gained the knowledge imparted, did not exist. The papers are 
 making much of Keats's ' Charmian,' and, on what they say is Mr. Dilke's 
 authority, assert that she was not only cold to him living, but indifferent 
 to his memory after he was dead. This does not accord with what Lord 
 Houghton has said on the same subject. Another story is that my 
 grandfather was so sensitive on the subject of the family origin, that it has 
 never been correctly chronicled ; others boldly assert that, like Jesus of 
 Nazareth, the poet was born in a manger. My excuse for calling your 
 attention to these matters is that I intend writing a biography of John 
 Keats ; and would be glad to get your testimony in regard to the subjects 
 herein mentioned, and also any other information you might kindly suggest. 
 If to this you will give your earliest convenience I will feel that a very 
 great kindness has been conferred. Please understand that under ordinary 
 circumstances I regard the discussion of such subjects as these very indeli- 
 cate, but inasmuch as they have already arisen, I think they had as 
 
254 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 well be disposed of. If my mother was here she would send her love to- 
 you, as it is I do it for her. Believe me to be with feelings of great respect, 
 dear Madam, your faithful and obedient servant, 
 
 " Jno. Gilmeb Speed." 
 
 It is naturally not surprising to learn that this communi- 
 cation was " anything but pleasant " to the sister of Keats, 
 Her letter to Severn is sufficient, even if other overwhelm- 
 ing testimony did not exist, to prove the gross untruth 
 of Haydon's allegations. 
 
 " 5, Calle de Lista, Madrid, 
 " Sept. 3, 1877. 
 " My deak Me. Severn, 
 
 " I enclose to you a letter which I have received from the grandson 
 of my brother George, which is anything but pleasant to me. I have not- 
 seen the Autobiography of Haydon ; but from what my nephew says it 
 contains a shameful calumny against my dear brother. Though perfectly 
 persuaded of its falsity I have not the means of answering it in such a 
 manner as to prove it a falsehood. Tell me, can an answer be given strong 
 enough to remove the only stain upon a character so pure and noble, or 
 must we bear it with patience ? 
 
 " It seems my nephew intends writing another biography. I am sorry 
 for it, as I don't think he will improve upon Lord Houghton's or rather 
 yours, where all has been said, and said well. 
 
 " How sorry I am that John is not in Eome to copy for me your 
 ' Marriage of Cana' — and the ' Pot of Basil.' As you suppose, he is doing 
 very little, he is so shy and serious that he does not manage to introduce- 
 himself among people who might be of service to him.* Rosa has made 
 great progress in music, and is quite a professor. 
 
 " I can't understand how you could ever have had enemies, you who are 
 so kind and desirous of serving everybody. After all you are a most 
 fortunate fellow to have obtained two pensions, when you could only have 
 expected one. I cannot express to you my regret at not being able to 
 send my subscription for the tomb of my dear brother. It seems the 
 original stone has not been removed, but repaired and raised, and a low 
 wall of stone has been placed around the grave. Do you know whether 
 the two bay trees I planted still remain ? 
 
 " I return you my warmest thanks for your sincere interest in my 
 welfare. I mentioned Mr. Gladstone as likely to serve me, from the great 
 admiration he feels for the genius of my illustrious brother. Though he 
 is not in office, he must have many acquaintances of influence. Tou will 
 
 * Keats's nephew, John Keats de Llanos, in addition to a certain artistic 
 faculty, inherited that literary bias which in some degree characterised 
 each of the Keats family. 
 
LETTER FROM CIIAS. COWDEN CLARKE. 255 
 
 do well to apply also to Lord Houghton, he may perhaps feel inclined to 
 sjive me. 
 
 " Our kindest remembrances to Eleanor and Arthur.* Believe me, 
 
 " Very sincerely yours, 
 
 " F. Keats de Llanos." 
 
 On the occasion of her second visit to Koine, in the late 
 autumn of 1863, Severn saw her and her family frequently. 
 In his Journal-entry for 29th October he writes: "Last 
 
 niffht she and I talked over all our cares and 
 
 felicities like brother and sister ; " and from several other 
 entries during the next three or four months it is clear 
 that Keats's sister was again and again a useful adviser and 
 mediator in certain difficulties in which Severn was then 
 involved. He wrote an enthusiastic account of their 
 friendly intercourse to Chas. Cowden Clarke, who, early in 
 February, wrote the following pleasant note : 
 
 " Villa Novello, 
 " Crosa, L. Oiacomo, 
 " Genoa, Feb. 11, 1864. 
 " My deak Severn, 
 
 " For many, and many a day I have not been so charmed and 
 interested with a letter, as by the one you sent me [us] the other day, — 
 and, like a thorough man of business— with no date to it. 
 
 " That meeting with Mrs. Llanos was equal — and with your description 
 of it — to a pure romance. Lord ! how palpably does the event represent 
 itself to me, my seeing her, — a very young child, walking round the grass- 
 plot in our garden at Enfield, with her brothers ; and my mother saying, 
 ' That is a very sweetly behaved child ! ' If I recollect correctly — she- 
 most resembled her brother George, who was very like his mother. John 
 was the only one in face and figure like the father. Mr. Llanos I think I 
 saw but once, and then casually. I believe he was a very fine fellow ; by 
 which (of course) I mean that he was a Liberty man. I suppose she is 
 alone in the world with her daughters. Remember me most kindly to her, 
 accompanied by every cordial wish for her happiness. It was, indeed, 
 worth while to have written that little memento of her noble-hearted, as 
 well as noble-minded brother — to have the reward — the last in the world 
 I should have expected, — the approbation and thanks of his sister, thinking 
 all were gone. With regard to what you propose in your letter respecting an 
 
 * Twin children of Mr. and Mrs. Severn : bom in London in 1841. 
 "When, in 1861, Severn went to Rome as Consul, his wife was too great an 
 invalid to go with him. She died at Marseilles in April, 1862. Her 
 husband arrived just too late to see her again in life. 
 
256 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 amended life of him — ' a consummation, &c, &o,' I could not now do so im- 
 portant a work, if at any time I were worthy, for, if you see the English 
 papers at all, you will know that Mary and I are in the thick of an engage- 
 ment to edit an edition of Shakespeare for Cassell, Petter, and Galpin, in 
 penny numbers with notes ; each No. containing two illustrations by Selous 
 — and beautifully executed. The third No. will be out on Saturday 
 nest. This undertaking will occupy us for many months ; but I'll tell 
 you what I will do ; if you will clap your shoulder to the wheel, and add 
 all you know ; and induce Mr. John Taylor (by the way, who is he ?) to 
 help you ; and if you will incorporate my reminiscences, I will see the 
 book through the press for you. There ought to be a better life of him. 
 Between ourselves, Holmes told me that Coventry Patmore was the writer 
 of the so-called ' Life of Keats.' If we should meet (which I trust we may ; 
 and, perhaps, ere long) I could talk much more of this matter to you. In 
 the meantime, think over this proposal of mine. And, my dear Severn ! 
 with a multitude of sweet thoughts of past happy times coming over me — 
 Well-walk, and other scenes; — With Mary's and my kindest regards, 
 believe me, yours in perfect sincerity, 
 
 " C. Cowden Clarke." 
 
 Boom may be found for the following excerpts from 
 Chas. Cowden Clarke's letters of a later date. The first, 
 dated 1864, is in acknowledgment of Severn's Keats-article 
 in the ' Atlantic Monthly ' for 1863. The second is addressed 
 to Clara Novello, then staying with the Severns. The others 
 will be noted by all interested in the subject of Keats's 
 portraits. Many of these, which pass as the work of Severn, 
 are certainly not by him. Chas. Brown, Seymour Kirkup, 
 and others, known and unknown, made copies : some good, 
 some bad. Among Severn's own authentic replicas there 
 are one or two of markedly inferior quality. The reader 
 should consult Mr. Buxton Forman's excellent paper on the 
 subject in the first volume of his monumental edition of 
 Keats's writings. 
 
 ■ " Villa Novello, Via San Qiacoma, Genoa. 
 
 " September 13th, 1864. 
 " My dear Severn, 
 
 " I have indeed much to thank you and your amiable daughter for 
 in the rich packet that reached me two or three days ago ; assure her that 
 I feel her kindness in undertaking such a task, very sensibly. 'Tis true the 
 * labour was one of love,' both for the matter copied and for the honoured 
 and cherished Author of the work. 
 
 "And as regards the composition itself, I have been exceedingly 
 
LETTERS FROM GHAS. COWDEN CLARKE. 257 
 
 interested, both in the variety of incident and in the easy and unhackneyed 
 character of your diction. 
 
 " Your account of Rogers, I confess, both astonished and shocked me ; I 
 had conceived so different an opinion of the man. Of Walter Scott — no ! 
 I was not ' astonished.' Never can I forget that he was a promoter, if not 
 a proprietor, of the ' Beacon,' one object in the starting of which infamous 
 publication was, to extinguish Hunt and Keats. 
 
 "Hunt could complain of no just warfare; but what offenco had the. 
 Boy-poet committed, except that of having been praised by a Radical. 
 Scott was a brilliant genius, but wonderfully remote from being a ' Great 
 Man.' 
 
 "One point in your article '(since you handsomely require my honest 
 ■opinion) I must regret the publishing, and that is, the last moments of 
 our beloved Keats. By 'the tone and character of your narration you have 
 led the world to believe that he was an unbeliever in Christianity, a 
 ■circumstance totally unknown to any person beyond his own circle : for 
 there is no trace of such a fact before the public from his own writings. 
 
 " Now if you suppose that any reader of the ' Churchman,' the ' Guar- 
 dian,' the ' Watchman,' or the * Record ' (the bulk of the so-called 
 Religious World) will be moved one hair's breadth in their opinion of his 
 reformation from your description, I think you are of an easy faith — for a 
 man of the world. 
 
 "With respect to your proposed plan for illustrating the ' Adonais, ' 
 &c, &c, of this I cannot but think with glowing anticipation. Mary 
 echoes me ; and Alfred — who is worth his whole race for a publishing 
 opinion — said instantly, 'What a charming book it would make!' I 
 therefore strenuously advise your instantly making your arrangements 
 with a publisher (why not Moxon ?) and setting tooth-and-nail to work, so 
 as to be out, if possible, neck-and-neck with Houghton's life. 
 
 " All that we can say about Emma's movements is naught ; of her 
 thoughts, that they are constantly upon ' Dear Rome ! ' ' Rome first, 
 Rome last, Rome midst, and without end.' 
 
 "Hoping to hear early news of your being hard at work; and with 
 kindest regard from my Mary and all, believe ever, my dear Severn, that 
 I am yours most truly, 
 
 " C. Cowden Claekb. 
 
 " Give my kindest regards to Madame Llanos, and tell her that I have 
 her little figure now before me walking with her brothers round the 
 grass-plot." 
 
 "May 3, 1875. 
 "How you will stare to see a letter (even of two lines) from me ! But 
 the fact is, I long to have what I have been led to expect from my 
 honoured and valued old friend, Severn. Will you then do me the 
 kindness to say that I hope he will fulfil his promise and send me bis 
 sketch for the tomb of, Keats ? Whether it be altogether what he himself 
 may approve, it will infallibly tend to, and even ensure the result of its 
 future establishment. I have completed what I intended to add to the 
 
 S 
 
258 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 future edition of my ' Recollections,' in which I have included the- last 
 sonnet, with his noble and perfect friend's first sketch profile ; and the 
 last profoundly affecting one. If he have any other Art record of our 
 beloved, and my school-boy companion, and teacher, I should gratefully 
 include it with the precious catalogue already promised to me." 
 
 " Genoa, 
 "Dear Severn, "June 2, 1875. 
 
 " Accept my cordial thanks for the truly kind message you sent me 
 through Sir Vincent Eyre in the letter you addressed to him here awaiting 
 his arrival in Genoa. He called upon us a few days ago, having been 
 delayed on his way by visiting Pisa, &c, &c, and when he came he told 
 us that you had obligingly commissioned him to say that you have 
 various memorials of our beloved Keats which you would place at our 
 disposal when you know the nature of the book I propose bringing out 
 relative to him. The book will consist of a reprint (with some additions) 
 of my ' Recollections of John Keats ' in the form'of an elegant illustrated 
 drawing-room book, and the illustrations would include your beautiful 
 profile-portrait of the young poet's head (of which I possess an excellent 
 copy made by my lost brother-in-law, Edward Novello) ; a fac-simile of 
 his autograph presentation of his first volume of poems to myself; a, 
 fac-simile of the manuscript sonnet he wrote into my copy of Chaucer's 
 ' Flower and the Leaf,' &c. To these would be added that exquisite and 
 most touching sketch of Keats asleep during his last illness, by yourself; 
 and (in consequence of your now expressed generous intention of furnishing 
 me with them) the ' Memorials ' mentioned by Sir Vincent Eyre. - 
 
 " In case the publishers resolve upon producing the work in question, I 
 shall not fail to let you know, that I may request the fulfilment of your 
 very friendly promise, and meantime believe me to be, with affectionate 
 regard from my wife, and myself, 
 
 : ',' Your obliged and attached old Friend, 
 " Charles Cowden Clarke." 
 
 " Genoa. 
 "June 3, 1875. 
 
 " Curiously enough I wrote to you yesterday, and now.this morning, I 
 receive your most kind and delightful letter of the 28th of May, enclosing 
 me the exquisite sketch of your ' first idea of the Keats's Statue.' ' ' 
 
 " I can hardly sufficiently express my sense of yduf kindness' in sending 
 it to me, or of my admiration at its beauty. Even this slight- sketch so 
 wonderfully well indicates his features and look as well as his favourite 
 attitude. The suggestive touch of sentiment, too, conveyed by the. lyre 
 having only a portion of its strings, is a lovely thought, as denoting the 
 interruption by early death of his poetical career. > > v 
 
 "You rejoice me by what you tell me in your letter of the interesting 
 ' memorials,' as well as of your being ' now on a work of Isabella and; the' 
 pot of Basil,' and of your 'cogitating a portrait of Keats in a rural scene 
 with the full moon.' 
 
VARIANTS OF THE KEATS-MINIATUBE. 259 
 
 " It does my heart good to see the evidences of your wdnderfully 
 preserved youth in age, my dear old friend. Your ' 81 ' years and my 
 ' 87 ' may interchange a hearty grasp of the hand and congratulate each 
 other on being permitted still to enjoy life so energetically. 
 
 " God bless you ! With love from my Wife and myself, and -warmest 
 thanks for your dearly -welcome letter, I am, dear Severn, 
 
 " Yours faithfully and gratefully, 
 " Charles Cowden Clarke." 
 
 " Villa Novello, Genoa, 
 " Mt dear Mr. Severn, " 27th November, 1877. 
 
 " Many thanks for your kind letter of 23rd Inst. 
 "I will not fail to continue the search you enjoin and which has 
 already been prosecuted, for the copy supposed to have been made by my 
 brother Edward ; but if it be in existence it would hardly serve your 
 purpose, inasmuch as that as well as others made in our family were a,ll 
 drawn from H. Meyer's engraving in Leigh Hunt's ' Lord Byron and His 
 Contemporaries,' so that these copies are one remove more from your 
 original beautiful pencil-sketch of dear John Keats. . 
 
 " Thanking you cordially for your kind promise to send me a photo- 
 graph when this most precious original is discovered, 
 
 " I am always, My dear Mr. Severn, 
 
 " Yours faithfully, 
 " Mary Cowden Clarke." 
 
 " Villa Novello, Genoa, 
 "My dear Mr. Severn, " 20th November, 1877. 
 
 " It was with true pleasure that I yesterday received your most 
 friendly letter of the 17th Inst, containing the welcome tidings of your 
 now feeling in better health and having ' resumed ' your ' painting.' Yon 
 mention a copy having been made by my younger brother Edward of the 
 portrait you drew of Keats, which he gave to Leigh Hunt ; but we possess 
 no copy by Edward, alas ! and I the more regret this since you request its 
 loan from me for engraving in a proposed Library Edition of the poet's 
 works, and to have to leave a request of yours uncomplied with is a pain 
 to me. Several copies were made for us of your sketch (as engraved and 
 printed in Leigh Hunt's book, ' Lord Byron and Some of His Contem- 
 poraries,') from Henry Meyer's facsimile of your drawing, but it was by 
 mistake we told you one of these copies was made by my lost brother 
 Edward. Do you remember the letter my beloved husband wrote to you 
 in: June, 1875, wherein he (replying to your question as to the nature of 
 the book on Keats which he always hoped to bring out) told you that it 
 would consist of a reprint (with some additions) of his ' Eecollections of 
 John Keats' in book form, and that the illustrations would include your 
 beautiful profile portrait of Keats (the one facs'imilied by H. Meyer), your 
 exquisite and most touching sketch of Keats asleep during his last illness, 
 and your graceful pencil-sketch of a design for Keats's motiumeDt ? 
 
 s 2 
 
260 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 "I still (and even now more earnestly than ever) hope to see this 
 intended book of my dear Charles's published according to his long- 
 cherished strong desire ; and, as I learn that your written permission to 
 print these several drawings would be requisite ere I could fulfil my hope, 
 I trust you will kindly send me the needful few lines authorizing me to 
 publish your lovely three sketches. 
 
 "I lately received a very agreeable letter from Mr. H. Buxton Forman 
 (who generously sent us a copy of his handsome edition of ' Shelley's 
 Works ') mentioning that he is in pleasant correspondence with you, and 
 that he is about to issue * a little volume of Keats's letters.' 
 
 " Wishing you a happy continuance of good health, I am, my dear 
 Mr. Severn, 
 
 " Yours faithfully, 
 " Mabt Cowden Clarke." 
 
 There is hardly need to explain at this late date that the 
 poet-traveller and colonist, Mr. Alfred Domett, is identical 
 with " Waring " in Browning's well-known poem. All who 
 have wondered "what's become of Waring," as well as 
 those who know the literary work of Mr. Domett, will read 
 with pleasure one of his few published letters. With 
 Mr. Domett, with the exception of Mr. J. G-. Cooke, 
 has probably passed away the last person who knew 
 Charles Armitage Brown. The reader will of course be 
 able to see wherein Severn's correspondent was at fault. 
 Of the two copies of the full-face miniature portrait of 
 Keats made by Brown after Severn's original, I am of 
 opinion, though not certain, that the portrait of Keats, 
 attributed in the catalogue of the National Portrait Gal- 
 lery in Edinburgh to Joseph Severn, is one. It is almost 
 certainly not Severn's handiwork, unless done very late in 
 life; but it is possible it may be by Seymour Kirkup, 
 though without his characteristic delicacy of touch and 
 tone.* In reference to Mr. Domett's closing paragraph, it is 
 
 * In connection with the mention of Seymour Kirkup at this period 
 may be given another of the many characteristic letters written by him 
 in his old age, when he had become what he called "a philosophical, 
 spiritualist." 
 
 " Florence : Ponte Vecchio, June 23rd, 1864. 
 "My deab Severn, 
 
 " Tour last letter was answered so long ago that I don't remember 
 what it contained. I should have written again, but supposed that you 
 were so engaged in diplomacy that you would find me troublesome. I 
 wanted to recommend to you my friend Daniel Home, but I was sure if he 
 
LETTER FROM S. KIRKUP. 2C1 : 
 
 a welcome surprise to learn that there was sufficient likeli- 
 hood of sale to justify an American bookseller, in the then 
 
 wanted protection he would be sure to find it in you, who have done so 
 niuoh good to your countrymen and others ; and I foresaw he would need 
 it to defend him against the Jesuits and priests, who are, of course, omni- 
 potent in Home ; and so it turned out, and I saw from the newspapers 
 that you had done all you could for him. I can answer for his being 
 neither an impostor nor a sorcerer (which is absurd), and I have found 
 him a man of honour, by actions, not by words of his or hearsay of others ; 
 and I know him to be very generous, though poor, and goodhearted, all 
 which is in his favour, and so likewise are the phenomena that spon- 
 taneously accompany him, and of which 1 have had sufficient experience 
 in my own house, watched and guarded with the most suspicious in- 
 credulity, which is stronger with me than with most people, as, perhaps, 
 \ ou may remember, for 1 was always so. 
 
 " My own proofs of our existence after death are entirely independent 
 of Home, and began before I knew him, or the works of Judge Edmonds, 
 which confirmed them ; and they settled my creed, very far from 
 canonical, either Eoman or Calvinistic, which, entre nous, are about 
 equally blasphemous and Jewish. But I will not write all I could, for 
 fear this should never reach you. I doubt if all your letters have come to 
 me, and the one I have just received was left for me — I was out — by a 
 priest ! I know the Prescobaldis and Mr. Hart. 
 
 "Do you ever see Miss Ironsides? A friend of hers (Mrs. Eamsay) 
 lately came to see me. Miss Ironsides was gifted as a medium, hut her 
 weak, vulgar mother extinguished her, and encouraged her. in common- 
 place studies under the direction of snobs, when she might have been a 
 painter of the imagination, like my old friend William Blake, who, I 
 thought, was mad, but I don't think so now. Plaxman, Stothard, and 
 Puseli were all suspected, and so were Danby, Varley, and even Martin ; 
 anyhow, they were original and showed mind, and even old West was 
 sometimes a mystic, and Barry and Loutherburg. After I proved the 
 truth of Spiritualism, which I scouted for a long time, I was induced to 
 follow up my experiments in hopes of some day seeing something worthy 
 to paint. I longed for a good vision, and do still, but I am not enough of 
 a medium. I have only seen, heard, and felt enough to be sure of the 
 existence of spirits ; neither books nor men were enough for me, and I 
 sought witnesses of my experience, and would not rely on my own 
 impressions alone, which might have been effects of imagination, waking 
 dreams ! But when half-a-dozen people were present, they could not all 
 be dreaming of the same thing. A lady wrote to me the other day that 
 Home had been raised in the air a hundred times since he came to London, 
 and had been seen by 1000 people. 
 
 " Basta ! you have doubtless heard enough about it, and I have seen 
 enough in my own house. 
 
 " What are you doing in painting ? Bible subjects are worn out, and 
 were never interesting to me. I have an Italian book that says the 
 Madonna ought to be painted ugly, as she was sixty when she died. 
 Young John lived to a hundred and was buried, hut never died, — his grave 
 moves. He is waiting for the last day to fulfil the prophecies. Bead Sir 
 John Mandeville's travels in the East in 1345, — an orthodox Englishman ! 
 
 "I have been long an admirer of Dante, but I think Shakespeare a 
 greater poet. Dante has been much with me in this room. Hi's poem is 
 not true, and Beatrice was not a portinari, as it has proved. 
 
262 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 (1834) small town of Buffalo, in the issue of an edition of 
 the poetical writings of Shelley, Coleridge, and Keats. 
 This purchase by Mr. Domett occurred in the same period 
 as that wherein Robert Browning, then a youth, vainly 
 sought in the part of London where he lived for a volume 
 of Shelley's poetry — and when his mother was told by the 
 more catholic bookseller of Oxford Street, who brought her 
 the chief writings of Shelley, that "here were also the 
 three volumes of the poetical works of a Mr. John Keats," 
 &c. — in other words, that the rarely asked for writings of one 
 poet should be companioned in sale by the still more 
 rarely sought verses of one even less known to fame. 
 
 " 32, St. Charles Square, North Kensington, 
 " London, W. 
 " Sib, 
 
 " You will be surprised at receiving a letter from a perfect stranger ; 
 but I trust that the circumstances I am about to mention will prove an 
 excuse for the intrusion. 
 
 " Among my friends in New Zealand (where I passed thirty years of 
 my life) was, and is, a Mr. Charles Brown — son of Charles ' Armitage 
 Brown, who emigrated with his only son to that colony about the year 
 1839 or 1840, and died at New Plymouth there a few years afterwards. 
 Charles Brown, the son, — since Superintendent of the Province of New 
 Plymouth, — ten or fifteen years ago, gave me a sketch in Indian ink — being 
 a portrait of poor Keats, the poet, on his death-bed ; at the foot of which 
 is written : ' Copied from a drawing by Joseph Severn, 28th January, 
 1821, 3 o'clock morning, drawn to keep me awake.' This, as Charles 
 Brown told me, was done by his father, the intimate friend, as you know, 
 of Keats. 
 
 " The copy, I think, bears evident marks of being most truthfully and 
 earefully executed ; and seems to prove that the original must also have 
 been a most truthful and striking likeness of the ' poor glorious ' being it 
 represented. For besides its obvious resemblance to the published 
 portraits of Keats, it shows all the affecting changes in. the lineaments of 
 
 " The Pope has forbid the title of * La Divina Comedia.' Here is too 
 long a yarn for a busy man like you. I wonder if you could get for me 
 the report of a trial in Rome, printed about fifteen years ago, of a Count 
 Alberti for forging and selling some MSS. of Tasso ? If you could secure 
 me a copy I will take care to repay you, and let you have the reading of it. 
 before you send it me, either by the post or private hand. It is very 
 curious, and would amuse you. Tasso was in favour with good spirits, 
 like Socrates. Adieu, dear Severn. 
 
 " Yours affectionately, 
 
 " Kibkup." 
 
LETTER FROM ALFRED DOMETT. 263 
 
 the countenance which the disease of which he died must have produced. 
 The face is wasted and thin ; the tangled hair thrown about the brow 
 in locks which look damp and straightened a little out of their natural curl 
 t>y midnight perspirations. The expression, as he his asleep, is resigned 
 and tranquil ; and but for this, the portrait would be intensely painful to 
 contemplate. Indeed, it is almost so, in spile of this; and, With the 
 words at the foot of it, makes the most pathetic piece of drawing I have 
 ever seen either on canvas or paper. 
 
 " The words just alluded to, which I have copied exactly as they stand, 
 seem to render necessary the inference that Mr. Brown made the copy at 
 ■3 o'clock in the morning to keep himself awake. Charles Brown (Jun.) 
 could not tell me much about it ; but, as far as I remember now, seemed to 
 think that the last words were written by yourself on the original portrait. 
 But as they are all in precisely the same hand, and as there are no 
 inverted commas or other mark to distinguish the first words (' Copied 
 from a drawing by Jos\ Severn') from those which follow, I cannot but 
 •conclude that Mr. Brown (Chas. A.) was himself watching by Keats's 
 bedside when he made this copy, and perhaps had relieved yourself, for a 
 short time, in the performance of that last painful act of friendship. 
 
 " As the fact (if it be one) of Chas. A. Brown's having attended Keats 
 at all during his last illness, is not mentioned in any life I have seen of the 
 Poet — and especially is not alluded to by Lord Houghton in his Memoir, 
 it occurred to me that the best way would be to apply for this information 
 directly to the source from which it could most certainly and conclusively 
 be obtained. And therefore it is that I am taking the liberty to address 
 you on the subject. 
 
 " Perhaps you could also enlighten me on another subject connected 
 with the portraits of the great poet. Charles Brown also gave me in New 
 Zealand a life-size medallion profile-portrait of Keats, which had belonged 
 to his father. It is in plaister of Paris, oval in shape, in a square frame of 
 dark oak. It is evidently the same portrait which is given in outline at 
 the head of Monckton Milnes's Memoir in his Illustrated edition of Keats's 
 poems ; and which, in the list of illustrations prefixed, is described as the 
 * Head of Keats — from a medallion by Giuseppe Girometti of Borne.' The 
 engraving shows in every line that it is an exact copy either of mine or of 
 some original of which mine is also a copy. I have no idea where the 
 •original is, or whether this of mine (formerly Chas. A. Brown's) is a replica 
 of an original also in plaister — by the same artist ; or merely a copy by 
 some other person. If you could give me any information on this point, 
 I should take it as a great favour. 
 
 " I hope you will not think it out of place, or not pertinent if I add 
 that I should have much pleasure (in addition to that of obtaining the 
 information I ask for) in receiving any communication from one, in whom 
 I have all my life taken an interest, and for whom in common with 
 numbers in all parts of the world where the English language is read or 
 .spoken, I have entertained all the respect and esteem which Shelley's 
 ieautiful eulogium in the Preface to ' Adonais ' could not but create — a 
 
264 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 heartfelt eulogy which has given such an enviable immortality to your 
 name and your noble friendship. That preface is before me as I write — 
 in a copy of an edition of Shelley, Coleridge, and Keats, which I bought 
 so long ago as 1834 at ' Buffalo,' now a great town on the American side- 
 of the Palls of Niagara. So far famed was your friendship for ' Adonais 
 — even at a period so long since passed away ! 
 
 " With renewed apologies for giving you this trouble, 
 
 " Believe me, Sir, 
 
 " Faithfully yours, 
 
 " Alfhed Domett." 
 
 The following remarkable letter by Mr. John George- 
 Cooke, the friend of Edward Trelawny, will be read with 
 close attention by all interested in that latter-day Viking, 
 and in what Mr. Cooke alludes to as the Byron and Shelley 
 period : as well as by all who bear Charles Brown in kindly 
 remembrance. It is printed here, though nominally ad- 
 dressed to his friend's son, and his own friend, Mr. Walter 
 Severn :* 
 
 " June 29th, 1878. 
 
 " As touching your request to write any news of Trelawny, ' Pirate * 
 Trelawny, or others connected with the Byronic, Shelley or Keats period* 
 I fear I can give you nothing very interesting. J. E. Trelawny — if he 
 were fourteen at the battle of Trafalgar, which he missed seeing owing to 
 the supineness, as it has been stated, of his Admiral, Duckworth, in getting 
 to sea and joining the Fleet under Lord Nelson and Collingwood — must 
 now be eighty-seven years old, is, I believe, very hale and strong. Some 
 four years have elapsed since I used to see him at the Turkish Baths, 
 at Brompton, and a finer specimen of a man of his age, it would be hard 
 to see ; he peeled as clean and muscular as a man of fifty. Your father 
 will have two years ago read the remarkable testimony of an Italian 
 boatman, at Spezzia, I think, who related to his, Trelawny 's, daughter 
 Letitia, the story current in that part of Italy that Shelley's yacht h;\d 
 been run down by a fishing-boat, no doubt with villainous intent, as they 
 had heard and believed Lord Byron with money was on board the yaclit 
 with Mr. Shelley and Captain Williams. It sounded vero, if not hen 
 trovato. Trelawny must have had a rude shock, if he, the old pirate, 
 could be shocked, at the Goring Divorce Case lately. . . . Did I ever 
 tell you of the unlucky end of the brother, Edgar Trelawny, the only 
 other child of that ill-fated match of Trelawny and Mrs. Goring (divorcee) ? 
 He married some woman of quality and made himself rather conspicuous. 
 in England, representing himself as a convert to Komanism ; that was 
 
 * Edward Trelawny died in 1881. It was his wont to say that the 
 only authentic likeness of him is the old Captain in Sir John Millais's 
 picture ' The North- West Passage.' 
 
LETTER FROM JOHN G. COOKE. 265 
 
 true, but added that he was the son of Sir John Salisbury Trelawny, the 
 Pirate's cousin, which he certainly was not. He imposed himself upon 
 Lord Denbigh and some other illustrious perverts ; in the end he died 
 rather suddenly. . . . Did I ever tell you a wonderful story— no doubt 
 there were hundreds extant some forty years ago — which I heard when a 
 midshipman in the Mediterranean in 1835, not so very long after the 
 Greek War of Independence, when Trelawny distinguished himself? It is 
 a curious and rather a ghastly story. Your father will well remember 
 that when Trelawny was in Greece he lived maritalement with a daughter 
 of the great Greek Chief Odysseus in the Morea, and she had a child by 
 him. When Trelawny left Greece for Italia he took this child with him. 
 Months afterwards the Odysseus family was made aware of the certainty 
 of not seeing their respected son-in-law again, and wrote to him begging 
 that the child might be sent back. A long time passed, and at last comes 
 a letter to say if the Chief Odysseus or his representative would come 
 across on a certain day to the Custom House at Zante, the child should be 
 forthcoming. A scampavia was dispatched and away went some of the 
 Odysseus family to Zante. The Custom House authorities could give no 
 account of any child, but they stated that a box bad arrived via Corfu, which 
 it was much wished should be removed by the Greeks, as it smelt offen- 
 sively. Whereupon the box was delivered and opened, and a child's body, 
 dead some weeks, appeared ; whether any invoice or remarks by Trelawny 
 accompanied it I never heard. The child had died, and he took this grim 
 and savage way of ridding himself of all connection with the Odysseus 
 circle. I wonder I never thought, when in New Zealand some thirty-five 
 years ago, and in constant communication with Mr. C. A. Brown, of asking 
 him if he had heard this story. My sister, who has been dead some 
 fourteen years, was wife to the British Besident, Major John Longley, a 
 brother of the late Archbishop of Canterbury, and she had heard it from 
 Zanteotes, although it must have happened before John Longley became 
 Kesident. 
 
 " I saw a great deal of Mr. Brown when in New Zealand ; poor gentle- 
 man, he made a great mistake in coming out to a then wild and savage 
 country, and where he was miserable. His son had gone before him, and 
 this was the inducement. He amused me by long stories of Keats, 
 Shelley, Byron, and Trelawny, and your good father, and the Hunts, &c. 
 &c. He died a sturdy Deist, and was very indignant at the attempt of 
 some Baptist or Independent persons to give him comfort. He used to 
 quote to them the reply of Voltaire when questioned as to his belief in 
 our Saviour. ' For the love of God, Sir, speak to me no more about 
 that Man.' He was buried outside the churchyard at Taranaki (New 
 Plymouth). His son and myself were his mourners, and there, under the 
 beautiful shadow of our glorious mountain Taranaki, after life's fitful 
 fever, let us hope he sleeps well. Now I have bothered you enough < 
 What evening shall I come and smoke the calumet? 
 
 " Yours ever, 
 
 " John Gbokge Cooke." 
 
266 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 The following letter from Seymour Kirkup may be read 
 as representative of his frequent correspondence with 
 Severn at this period. 
 
 " August 18th, 1861. 
 " My dear Severn, 
 
 " I never thought Overbeck a fine intellectual creature, but an igno- 
 rant humbug. Gibson described his great picture to me with admiration 
 and equal ignorance. The subject was a bad. one, a collection of portraits 
 •of old painters, taken, as you say, from prints ; all the schools, the English 
 represented by an infant. This dauber of brickdust and pewter, without 
 drawing, presumed in his ignorance to despise such giants compared to 
 him as Keynolds, Opie, Stothard, West, Lawrence, Fuseli, Turner, 
 Flaxman, &c, &c. Ignorance and vanity. As for his imitation of the 
 ancients he should have looked at the works of Giotto here for colour, and 
 he would not have abounded in such detestable lead colour as I have seen. 
 In fact he has copied only the defects of the old time, viz., hardness, 
 .meagreness, and sameness. Nay, he may look at the Florentine 
 M. Angelo in the Sistine, and he will see effects of colour worthy of Venice 
 — the Jerome, Daniel, Zachariah, Sibyls, &c. You say he is devout to the 
 political church. So is many a solemn ass and many a Jesuitic knave. 
 What is your Gothic or Christian treatment of the [your] Marriage [of 
 Cana] ? What would you call th,at of P. Veronese ? Neither ; but the 
 princely magnificence and worldly splendour of Venice, eclipsing even the 
 story itself. Wealth, luxury, palaces, concerts, and a blaze of colour, so -fine 
 in its way as to make the subject commonplace and leave it beyond the 
 reach of any follower. You have no chance, nor Miss Ironsides, who is all 
 wrong, and has mistaken her vocation. Scripture subjects are worn out. 
 They make no impression, like old-fashion music or sermons. The public 
 sleep over them ; like the bedstead of Baucis that was turned into pease, 
 
 " ' Which still their old employment keep 
 Of lodging folks disposed to sleep.' 
 
 " The Venetians sacrificed their Christianity, if they had any, to worldly 
 ■magnificence. That fine picture of Bonifazio, 'Dives and Lazarus,' is 
 another example of it. Lazarus is disgusting and therefore eclipsed by 
 the prevailing wealth of Dives pervading all the scene, but the marriage 
 was one contradiction beyond this. 
 
 " There is a wedding dinner of poor country people, so poor that even 
 the wine falls short. Then think of the scene of P. Veronese! An 
 absurdity, but such execution conquers all. Who can hope to surpass 
 that ? I do not like sacred subjects in general, nor costume pictures. 
 David was a failure, but the classic is not exhausted by him. There is 
 still a field open : Drawing from nature with the help of the antique and 
 colour like Titian. Our ' Bacchus and Ariadne' and the Spanish sleeping 
 •Ariadne' are the models of a new school, which somebody will find out. 
 We are too old. There are other specimens and hints even in Home (the 
 
LETTER FROM S. KIRKUP. 267 
 
 Borghese). Etty might have done much if he had hit on it, or Haydon. 
 A combination of great talents in those two elements, and then a genius 
 •of imagination worthy of the rest. Who can bear to think of the poor 
 child's-play of the solemn Mr. Overbeck — and you, coming from England, 
 find I suppose Paris ! But I am in the dark about them in the present 
 day. I fear they are wofully gone down. Eastlake had better have 
 stuck to his palette than the study of after-dinner speechifying. Detest- 
 able ! By the bye they said that you had been favoured by him at the 
 expense of Haydon in the affair of the cartoons. You accuse him now, 
 his pride. As for his wife she cannot hinder his painting. She complains 
 of his tyranny, and told a lady of my acquaintance that he would not even 
 let her know where he was going, and he set off to Italy. 
 
 " You say people are fascinated and never recover their sober reason. 
 They must be crazy, I suppose. Take care of yourself. You talk of a 
 new Jerusalem of Art and breathing in company of its immortal spirits ! 
 Now real Spiritualism is a science that requires the greatest exercise of 
 reason. You are afraid of being carried off your feet. I could tell you a 
 strange story. There is no fear, and I don't meddle with everybody's 
 opinions. Miss Ironsides has some favourable dispositions, but her stupid 
 mother cramped them, and she has gone wrong ever since she went to 
 Borne amongst ignorant people, until she has fallen into the vulgar and 
 commonplace, by all accounts. I only judge from hearsay. I hate the 
 ■cant about Art aud artists, her art and my art, artistic gossip of art and 
 artists and early art and primitive art, love of art, &c, &c. I never called 
 myself an artist; I said painter at once; I had rather have added glazier 
 than artist. All the tea-drinking old maids were full of their pretty 
 -artists and all the little drawing-masters, daubers, and parasites of art 
 were full of the name, whilst the great were always sneering at it. One 
 told me he had a clever artist travelling with him. It was his cook. A 
 lady bestowed the title on her hairdresser. It is not that I care for such 
 •classification, for I am very democratic, but I am sick of the vulgar cant, 
 and find that others are so too, so if you publish anything avoid it. ' The 
 word is prostituted and blackballed. 
 
 " Your pergola is better than columns, and your idea of the water in the 
 .act of changing is new, but I fear it is not enough to be the making of it, 
 even if it can be done, which is difficult. 
 
 " I have a drawing by Miss Ironsides of an angel and a child which 
 she saw in a crystal of mine. It is not much, but it is enough to prove 
 that she has the faculty, a rare one, and more valuable than worn-out 
 Bible pictures, thanks to her mother and Roman advisers. I have some 
 wonderful and curious drawings of visions. I have only wished to 
 succeed myself, as has been done in America, but I have not the power. 
 I only have that of bringing it out in others. I know no one to carry 
 books to Borne. They won't do it, they are afraid, and I have lost so many 
 books that I have lent, or commissions sent, that I have long refused, 
 and have a paper, pasted in my library many years ago, to say so. I am a 
 •collector, and have many thousand. I have a hundred and more of Dante, 
 
268 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 and seven MSS. of him, many on our English Bound Table in all languages, 
 a great many on occult sciences, literature, antiquities, painting, &c. . . . 
 
 " Yours sincerely, 
 
 " S. Kirkttp." * 
 
 In a letter 'dated April, 1868, he communicated a fact 
 which, I believe, is little known : 
 
 " You have heard that the King has made me a knight and a baron : for 
 some discoveries I made in Florence respecting Dante, so I suppose. All 
 that is said in my diploma and other papers is, 
 
 ' In considerazione di particolari benemerenze.' 
 
 I never knew more, and the minister who recommended me to him died 
 of the cholera in Sicily. He was a Sicilian, and I had never heard his 
 name till then (Natoli) or knew any of his friends. It was a perfect 
 surprise tp me, always the same poor devil of a painter, on which account 
 I only call myself chevalier." 
 
 Either in the second or third year of his Consulship, 
 Severn heard rumours that the Pope was about to issue a 
 Schedule of Special Instructions to his Voluntary and 
 Official Guard during Holy Week, with particular stress on 
 their line of conduct towards heretical foreigners who might 
 be present at the ceremonies in St. Peter's : and, it was said, 
 His Holiness was emphatic in his determination neither 
 
 * The following excerpt, from Seymour Kirkup's last letter to Severn, 
 written in 1870, will interest musicians : 
 
 " Tou ask about my scale of chords ; I enclose it. You will see all the 
 possible combinations by thorough-bass reduced to one line of music paper !' 
 It is written for one key only, that of Do ; of course all the other eleven- 
 tones contained in the octave are subject to the same limitations. I have- 
 given it to several musicians and composers, asking them to bring me any 
 chord that is not contained in this table, if they can find one. Two or 
 three have brought what they thought they had found, either in their own 
 works or the works of the great masters ; but they were mistaken, and T 
 showed them where the discords were marked in my list. To make them 
 more easily found I have marked them with the letters of the alphabet, 
 and I have given them the old numerical signatures which were used by 
 the old masters. The laws of modulation you of course know, and the 
 usual preparation and resolution of discords. I have written upon all these 
 subjects, and at the beginning I analysed four of the grandest and most 
 chromatic symphonies, to see if 1 could find any chord not put down in 
 my list, were eoelosed. They were Roberto il Diavolo, William Tell, Don 
 Giovanni, and The Creation, which last was the only one that had a 
 crash that was intended for chaos no doubt, and is not to be considered as 
 music. You will see it near the beginning, one chord only. It was too 
 ugly to be dwelt on or repeated. It is followed by the rolling of the 
 elements into harmony in sublime style." 
 
STRANGE CONDUCT AT ST. PETER'S. 269 
 
 himself any longer to endure, nor to permit the faithful to 
 suffer from, the unseemly conduct of many Protestant ladies, 
 British and American. Severn managed to procure a copy 
 of these " Private Instructions." The following is a literal 
 translation, which, alas, for all one's shame on account of 
 those who gave cause for the deep resentment which 
 undoubtedly prevailed, will hardly be read without 
 amusement. 
 
 Instructions to the Secret and Honourable Gentlemen Chamber- 
 lains WEARING THE SWORD AND CAP OP HlS HOLINESS, AND TO THE 
 
 Officials of the Palatine Military Corps, during Holt Week. 
 
 " These Gentlemen Chamberlains will be responsible for the observance 
 of that decency and respect due the holiness of the place and the 
 ceremonies; and for the maintenance of order in all the partitioned 
 sections separately entrusted to each Gentleman Chamberlain. The 
 officials of the military corps have also a like responsibity in the various 
 places assigned to their charge and watchfulness. 
 
 " The one will aid the other in the various objects of their respective 
 offices. 
 
 " They must obtain obedience as regards order and decency by any 
 means, however desperate ; first beginning with the most insinuating 
 supplications, and in the sweetest and tbe most imploring manner ; but 
 when this fails they must snatch away the offending lady without the 
 hope of pardon, whoever she may be, and expel her from the holy place. 
 
 " It is to be particularly observed by the Chamberlains that they do 
 not permit the ladies to stand bolt upright in the most solemn moments 
 of the sacred functions, and most of all, at the elevation of the Mass. 
 "Whoever does not obey is (the solemn moment being over) to be dragged 
 out of her place for disobedience. Also, this alternative is to be enforced 
 for all acts of indecency which may be committed on other occasions by 
 the ladies, such as feeding, guzzling, or laughing and screaming in an 
 inconvenient manner. With the aid of the officials of the Swiss and Palatine 
 guards -(according to the place) there shall also be turned away from the 
 Ladies' Sections all those'gentlemen who are there chattering with these said 
 ladies, and the guards are also to prevent any ladies from climbing up 
 over the tops of the sections and then jumping down to get away quicker. 
 Whoever attempts to transgress these orders is to be got rid of by any 
 means, however ugly. 
 
 " At the close of every ceremony the sins of each offending lady will 
 be reported to the Maggiordomo of His Holiness in order that the subse- 
 quent punishments shall be administered according to the circumstances. 
 (Signed) " The Maggiordomo of His Holiness, 
 
 " M. Borromai Arese.'' 
 
270 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Another example of unintentional humour is- the follow^ 
 ing highly entertaining denunciatory epistle from Mr. 
 Morris Moore, the discoverer and possessor of the beautiful 
 little picture of 'Apollo and Marsyas,' finally purchased 
 for the Louvre as a genuine work of Eaphael, though now 
 either attributed tentatively to that artist or indubitably 
 considered to be the handiwork of Perugino. The late 
 Mr. Morris Moore was not to be affronted with impunity 
 by any shadow of doubt as to the authenticity of his 
 "Eaphael." The present writer well remembers visiting 
 him at his house in Eome one day in 1883, and the ordeal 
 he had to go through before and during inspection of th© 
 unquestionably most beautiful and masterly ' Apollo and 
 Marsyas.' The slow approach, the skilful verbal incentives 
 to curiosity and excitement, the entrance as into a Holy 
 of Holies, and the withdrawal of a veil suddenly so as 
 to let the whole splendour of Eaphael's genius flash forth 
 at once as convincingly or rather overwhelmingly, all this,, 
 and the still more trying period to follow, are not things to 
 be forgotten. Fortunately for his peace of mind he never 
 received any such damnatory epistle as that addressed to 
 Severn, though that individual simply laughed at it as "a 
 very excellent farrago of nonsense." 
 
 "To Joseph Severn, Esq., English Consul at Eome: 
 
 " 147, Via delle Quattro Fontane, Some, 
 
 "April 12th, 1867. 
 "Sib, 
 
 "Tour reply to my letter of the 7th provokes notice. To have 
 detected, in a plain request, a 'command,' argues either marvellous 
 subtlety of wit or ignorance of our vernacular. 
 
 " It is time you learned from Johnson, that ' to request 'means -' to ask, 
 solicit.' You announce having ' sent my letter to Lord Derby.' As my 
 only letter was that addressed to yourself, and as you are silent upon the 
 packet of printed Documents and Declarations directed to Lord Derby, I 
 am left in doubt whether I am your debtor for an unsolicited, favour, or 
 still your creditor for the execution of a legitimate request. But since 
 the remedy for what may be but confusion of language lies with, myself, 
 I waive this point. 
 
 " In the face of the irrefragable evidence, printed and manuscript, with- 
 which, notwithstanding your undeniable previous familiarity with the 
 case, I had been at the pains to furnish you, your constructive impeach- 
 
AN AMUSING LETTER. 271 
 
 ment of my veracity as to the authorities and witnesses whom I had 
 quoted, is a specimen of knavish insolence too patent for comment. 
 Indeed, your epistle is a nicely poised compound of meanness, duplicity, 
 and silly inference, congenially served up in clumsy and vulgar diction. 
 I at once submitted it to several competent persons, and was flattered to 
 find them unanimously confirm my silent estimate of it. The superlative 
 compliment which you think due to my 'tone 'will certainly never be 
 paid to yours. I agree that your smile could no wise advantage a 
 ' universally acknowledged first-rate specimen of the finest period of 
 Italian Art ' — ' a work of Art of great national importance ' — a painting 
 ' acknowledged by all Europe to be the work of Baphael ' (Lord Elcho, 
 Morning Post, June 10, 1850 : and Frederick Overbeck, Illustration, 
 7 Fevrier ; and Avgsbourg Gazette, 18 April, 1864), or indeed anything 
 admirable, but I must demur to the fond illusion that your frown could 
 blast it. 
 
 " Had you asked to see this masterpiece, I was bound to acquiesce ; but, 
 unwilling to wound, I should, to say nothing of the obvious slight to so 
 many eminent authorities and unbought witnesses, have studiously shunned 
 the bitter sarcasm of inviting the 'opinion' of one so utterly without 
 status to sit in judgment upon Baphael, as Mr. Fine- Arts Consul Severn. 
 
 " Your prognostic, while possessing the first testimonies in the world to 
 its genuineness, that you ' might not consider as a work of Raphael's,' a 
 masterpiece which, to this hour, you have not even seen, suggests, apart 
 from its arrogance, a graver consideration. It betrays a foregone conclusion, 
 and so brings you within the scope of the distinguished Cornelius's highly 
 endorsed denouncement, which for your further edification I retranscribe ; 
 namely, that ' only the grossest ignorance of Art coupled with equal 
 effrontery, or malignity fed by lucre, could dare insinuate a doubt as to 
 the authenticity of a work so eminently characteristic of Baphael, as the 
 Apollo and Marsyas. 
 
 ' But fools rush in, &c.' 
 
 " That one, foisted into place only to be pointed at as a sorry notoriety 
 and to bring ridicule and contempt upon the name of ' Englishman ' in a 
 centre such as Borne, should play the hack to an unscrupulous faction, is 
 a natural combination that has found in: you consummate exemplification. 
 
 "Mobeis Moore." 
 
 The succeeding note is given as an instance of how 
 Severn, whenever he saw his way, made use of his official 
 position to achieve some good for the people among whom 
 he lived. The original, of course, is in Italian. 
 
 " To Cardinal Berardi. 
 
 " Tolfa, Civita Vecchia, 
 
 "6th July, 1870. 
 " My Lord Cardinal, 
 
 " I write from Tolfa to implore your Excellency to aid me in a good. 
 
 office for this most excellent people ; for the supply of water. Last year, 
 
272 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 with the assistance of the illustrious Padre Secche, a fine spring was 
 found in the mountains only one mile from the town, and the generous 
 Padre calculated the work, the expense, and all the possibilities, which he 
 pronounced to be met without difficulty. But on my return here this 
 summer I am disappointed with the progress made ; and it is all assigned to 
 the want of money (or to the want of spirit ?). The sufferings of , the poor 
 women in the winter going down in the frost and ice two miles for the 
 water, as well as the excellent character of the people for industry, 
 honesty, and religious faithfulness to their sovereign, induce me thus to 
 trouble your Excellency and to implore you to intercede with His 
 Holiness to grant them a small sum for carrying out this work. I beg to 
 assure your Excellency that I join most sincerely in this supplication, 
 naving now had four years' experience of this good and righteous people. 
 
 " Craving pardon for the liberty I take, and avowing that I would not 
 take it, did I know any one else for this benevolent task, I have the 
 honour to remain, my Lord Cardinal, 
 
 " Your Eminence's most humble and grateful servant, 
 
 " Joseph Severn." 
 
 In 1878 was issued the book to which he had looked 
 forward with so much interest; the collection of Keats's 
 letters to Miss Brawne. He could not but be gratified by 
 the generously-worded dedicatory preface, and, as a friend 
 has informed me, repeated in a voice broken by deep 
 emotion the words " whithersoever the name of our ' Adonais ' 
 travels there will yours also be found." But, as there has 
 already been occasion to remark, his expressions of as- 
 tonishment in his letter of acknowledgment to Mr. Forman 
 cannot be taken too literally. Essentially a man of 
 moods, he was ever swayed easily to this or that point 
 of outlook ; hence the innumerable self-contradictions 
 one encounters in his statements, letters, and friends' re- 
 miniscences of his sayings and doings. He guessed, if 
 he did not wholly understand, the causes of the secret 
 grief of Keats, even before the last bitter days ; and a few 
 years later he heard every particular from Charles Brown. 
 Severn, in fact, was always "understanding for the first 
 time." 
 
 In the seventies Severn saw much of his eminent 
 American friend, Mr. James T. Fields, when the latter 
 was in Borne, and heard from him frequently when he 
 was at his home in Boston. Two letters from this valued 
 
LETTERS FROM J. T. FIELDS. 273 
 
 correspondent may be given : the first because of its 
 allusion to the 'Ariel,' the study for which is repro- 
 duced here ; and the second as of interest in connection 
 with the matter touched upon above. It gives, moreover, 
 an indication as to Severn's age at the time when he made 
 the drawing of himself, which is reproduced in this 
 volume. What is more important is, that it affords 
 gratifying proof of Severn's regret — once he had really 
 read from first to last the volume of Keats's letters to 
 Fanny Brawne, and pondered the matter of their publica- 
 tion — proof rather of his "sense of outrage on the poet's 
 memory," in the giving to the public letters so absolutely 
 private.* 
 
 " Boston, U.S.A., 
 
 " May 15, 1871. 
 
 " Mr deak Mr. Severn, 
 
 " It made me smile, when I began to read your letter this morning from 
 Eome, as I opened upon the sentence in which you say you are afraid I 
 may not remember you. When I cease to remember you, I shall ask to 
 be quietly taken to the idiot asylum. Don't I mention your name at 
 least twenty times a week, when I show those two charming pictures 
 which I bore away from your studio in London so many years ago ? The 
 ' Ariel ' hangs in my library, and the Gainsborough in the reception-room 
 below, and they are both the delight of my eyes and those of my friends. 
 The ' Ariel,' being on panel, has warped somewhat, and I am afraid to 
 entrust it to any one in order to bring it back. How I wish you were 
 here to-day, and were going to dine with me, and afterwards give me 
 your advice touching the panel, and how to restore it ! 
 
 " I will with very great pleasure have a photograph of that drawing of 
 Keats, which you kindly made for me, taken and sent wherever you 
 direct. You do not say in your note whether it shall be sent to you or 
 Lord Houghton. Your daughter is right : the sketch is indeed admirable. 
 
 " I am charmed to hear you are still painting, and as I know you intend 
 to live a good many years longer, I hope to see you and your works 
 together some day in Eome. You and I, I am sure, would have many a 
 long ramble together, and dear Keats would come in for a great share of 
 our talk. Every spring I think of the early flowers in the Eoman gardens, 
 and wish I could gather them, as I have so many times in my life, durin^ 
 the first months of the year. 
 
 * Fairness to Severn demanded the insertion of the second of these 
 notes ; but it would be unwelcome as well as needless to print his letter to 
 Mr. Fields, or to adduce further evidence of his pain at having his name 
 associated with what he came to consider so regrettable a disloyalty to Keats. 
 
274 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 " Do you ever hear nowadays from Mr. and Mrs. Charles Cowden Clarke, 
 and where are they ? Where is Mr. Newton, and are you altogether under 
 the same Roman roof? 
 
 " Mrs. Fields joins me in kindest remembrances, and sincerely hopes 
 ■with me that some day we three shall meet again. 
 
 " Most faithfully yours, 
 
 "Jambs T. Fields." 
 
 " 148, Charles Street, Boston, 
 
 "February 3, 1879. 
 
 " My dear Friend, 
 
 "If you could have looked in upon us when your letter arrived here a 
 few days ago, you would have been amused with our enthusiasm over its 
 advent. We had friends staying here who are just as familiar with your 
 name as we are, and they too jumped for. joy to hear the contents of that 
 epistle, telling us of your renewed health. We had all heard of your 
 illness, and longed to get word from Eome that you were recovering, so 
 your letter made us happy to that extent, we could have rung our Boston 
 bells for joy. Now please to go on increasing in health and happiness, 
 and when you feel a little tired of the Scale Dante, come over here and 
 let us have a good time over you. 
 
 "Yes, dear friend, I think with you that the publication of those 
 Letters to Fanny Brawne is an outrage on the poet's memory, and I say 
 so in my lecture every time I read it. To tear his heart out in this way, 
 and exhibit it to the gaping crowd is pitiful indeed. You can have no 
 idea of the interest there is in America touching everything that concerns 
 Keats. When I show your portrait of him to the audience, every one 
 rushes forward to look at it, feeling that now the true effigy can be seen. 
 I always tell the story of your devotion to him, and now I shall show the 
 beautiful photo of yourself at twenty-seven which you send me, and for 
 which I return ten thousand thanks. My wife adds (with her love) ten 
 thousand more. 
 
 " I shall tell Longfellow, when I see him next week, what you say of 
 his Dante, and I know he will be pleased. We have lost Bryant during 
 the past year, and to-day Richard Henry Dana (ninety-one years old) 
 passed forward to take his place among the band of shining ones. Long- 
 fellow will be seventy-three in a few days, but that is only boyhood 
 compared to Dana and Bryant's term of years. After all, what is age t 
 You and I are as young, under our waistcoats, as we were at twenty. 
 Why not ? You are in Rome, with your brush in hand, just as you were 
 sixty years ago. Who talks of Age ? Down with the caitiff, says 
 
 " Your affectionate friend, 
 " James T. Fields." 
 
SEVERN'S CONSULAR YEARS. 275 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 Severn's Consular years — Severn's latter days — Mr. Ruskin's encomia — 
 Death of Joseph Severn — Suggestions for Severn's gravestone — Severn 
 and his contemporaries — The ' Endymion ' picture — Keats and Severn 
 buried side hy side. 
 
 It would be beyond the scheme of these memoirs to go 
 into as full detail in the chronicle of the consular years of 
 Joseph Severn as in that of the first five decades of his life. 
 It is true that these years were to him among the most 
 crowded with many interests, but others have given us 
 more exact and satisfying accounts of the drama of the last 
 days of the Temporal Dominion of the Popes, and of the 
 rise of that new Italy, which was so rapid when once, in 
 the saying of the Eoman populace, the steam came from 
 the boiling water in the Sardinian kettle. As for the art- 
 wort achieved by Severn between 1860 and 1879, there is 
 not much to be said. It is not equal to that of an earlier 
 and, artistically, more fortunate period, though the ' Mar- 
 riage of Cana' and other ambitious undertakings prove 
 that, for all his advanced age and manifold avocations, his 
 real vocation afforded him occupation to the end. Among 
 his latest pictures was a portrait of himself at the age of 
 eighty-two, in his consular uniform, and with the decora- 
 tion of the Order of the Crown of Italy, which had been 
 presented to him by King Victor Emmanuel in recognition 
 of his many and valuable services to individual Italians 
 and to Italy and the Italian cause. Yet two years later 
 the veteran artist is still at his easel. He finishes his 
 ' Isabella and the Pot of Basil,' and begins a small 
 portrait of Keats for General Sir Vincent Eyre. In these 
 latter days his thoughts and ideas are all animated by the 
 
 t 2 
 
276 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 memory of his " dear and illustrious friend, so long while ago 
 dead and yet so gloriously living." He is deeply touched 
 and pleased when Mr. Buxton Fornian sends him his 
 volume of Keats's Letters to Miss Brawne, with its dedication 
 to himself. The latest entry but two in the last of his 
 long series of Diaries, is a record of his having just pro- 
 jected " a new Keats picture " ; but it was never begun, for 
 a few weeks later he was at rest from his labour in that 
 sacred Roman dust where his heart already lay. 
 
 It was, from the first, an eventful period, and Severn was 
 so busily occupied with matters of consular, uiban, and 
 national interest that weeks and sometimes months would 
 pass without his putting brush to canvas. In his capacity 
 as acting " 'Sardinian " consul also he had his hands full, 
 and the early record of his official duties again and again 
 sets forth his efforts on behalf of imprisoned or detained 
 Italian workmen, and against all manner of high-handed 
 and unscrupulous dealings on the part of the Papal Govern- 
 ment. In the second year of his consulship he had become 
 so accustomed to stirring times that he took everything 
 that came much as he did sudden changes in the weather, 
 and was equally ready to do anything or nothing as the 
 circumstances might demand, whether it was the case of a 
 fair countess who applied to him officially for funds to 
 enable her to elope with an impecunious cavalier, rumour 
 of collision between the French and Papal troops in the 
 Forum during the Carnival, or reports of Garibaldi's 
 " malignant activity " in the South, and of the corresponding 
 ferment among the Roman populace. Nor was his position 
 a pleasant one, for the Papal Government and party were 
 incensed against Great Britain. All "liberal" officials 
 were ordered to quit Rome. English residents became 
 more and more uneasy, and when at last an English priest 
 was attacked in the streets, many of them broke up their 
 homes and left the city. Rome became a hotbed of evil 
 passions. Just as Victor Emmanuel was said to be ap- 
 proaching from the North, and Garibaldi from the South, 
 when the French troops were being moved backward 
 
SEVERN'S CONSULAR YEARS. 277 
 
 and forward like chessmen, and British warships had 
 anchored off Oivita Vecchia, when in Rome itself there was 
 a medley of crime, disorder, panic, defiant fury, sullenness, 
 and general anticipation of vital change, when even a 
 suburban train was attacked and pillaged by brigands, and 
 . when in the Holy City one hundred and seventeen murders 
 or attempted murders were committed within three months, 
 at this time the Pope elected to canonize twenty-one more 
 saints. As Severn aptly remarks, if His Holiness had 
 given orders for the construction of twenty-one more trains, 
 or for the execution of twenty-one notorious assassins, or 
 for the release of twenty-one unjustly imprisoned citizens, 
 or even for the banishment of twenty-one mischief-pan- 
 dering Princes of the Church, his action would have been 
 more to the point and been infinitely more appreciated. 
 Yet throughout the eventful years when the Papal Tem- 
 poral Power tottered to or rather in its grave, and ere 
 Victor Emmanuel entered Borne as King of United Italy, 
 as well as in the troublous years that followed, Severn was 
 a kind of Prince in the foreign society of Eome. He went 
 to and fro, always serene, always affable, invariably quick 
 to see the best side of every question, to mediate between 
 bitter opponents and in bristling disputes. When, under his 
 windows, a turbulent section of the populace was jeering at 
 the Papal troops and crying out Viva il Be ! or Viva, 
 Garibaldi ! he was sitting composedly at his easel painting 
 his ' Marriage of Cana ' ; when the Romans were wild over 
 the previous night's batch of murders, or the stoppage of a 
 train by brigands just outside the walls, he was organizing 
 parties to entertain Shelley's son and Lady Shelley, 
 Madame Keats de Llanos, or other friends, or writing his 
 reminiscences of his early days, or even venturing into the 
 hill country to visit Frederick Overbeck at Rocca di Papa. 
 Now and again even his equanimity was upset, as in the 
 eventful year of 1870, which saw the burial of the Temporal 
 Power, the advent of Italy among the Great Powers, the 
 Declaration of War between France and Prussia, and, in 
 July, the Promulgation of the Infallibility of the Pope. 
 
278 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 Severn's concise comment is, " The world is going mad, and 
 all the dreams of civilisation are at an end." The fall of 
 the Temporal Power was a shock to him ; he was astounded 
 by the Decree of Infallibility ; but he was ' paralysed ' by 
 the rumour that a lady had been appointed to the Chair 
 of Literature at Bologna. 
 
 His consulship came to an end in 1872, but he was 
 not left without permanent recognition of his services, 
 though the pension of £80 granted to him was a meagre 
 one. A few weeks later, however, he learned that he was 
 granted a further pension of £60 out of the Civil Fund. 
 
 In 1874 he hoped to gain recognition from the Italian 
 Government of his scheme for uniting the Mediterranean 
 and Adriatic by means of a canal from Ostia to Pescara, but 
 his project was looked upon askance, though commended 
 in theory. Four years later Victor Emmanuel died, and, 
 shortly after, Pope Pius IX. " Another tired old man will 
 follow them soon," wrote Severn. 
 
 There is a pathetic entry in the Diary wherein Severn 
 records the passing of his eighty-third birthday. The pathos 
 of the words is the more direct because of their simplicity 
 and isolation. His sole comment is, " I begin to feel the 
 loneliness of having lived too long." 
 
 He had lived a life singularly full of interest, and with 
 much of pleasure and charm. Perhaps his chief good- 
 fortune was his buoyant and happy temperament — a tem- 
 perament which enabled him to declare again and again 
 throughout each decade in his long life, that such and such 
 a day, that this or that experience, was the happiest he had 
 ever known. He was one of those natures into whose 
 heart and mind a ray of sunshine entered at birth and never 
 vanished. 
 
 " But there is nothing," writes Mr. Ruskin, after \\U account of his visit 
 to Rome, and a tribute to the other friend, Mr. George Richmond, R.A., who 
 
SEVERN'S LATTER DAYS. 279 
 
 helped to make his stay so pleasant ; " but there is nothing in any circle 
 that ever I saw or heard of, like what Mr. Joseph Severn then was In Rome. 
 He understood everybody, native and foreign, civil and ecclesiastic, in what 
 was nicest in them, and never saw anything else than the nicest ; or saw 
 what other people got angry about as only a humorous part of the 
 nature of things. It was the nature of things that the Pope should be at 
 St. Peter's, and the beggars on the Pincian steps. He forgave the Pope 
 his papacy, revereuced the beggar's beard, and felt that alike the steps 
 of the Pincian, and the Aracoeli, and the Lateran, and the Capitol, led to 
 heaven, and everybody was going up somehow; and might be happy 
 where they were in the meantime. Lightly sagacious, lovingly humor- 
 ous, daintily sentimental, he was in council with the Cardinals to-day, 
 and at picnic in the Campagna with the brightest English belles to- 
 morrow ; and caught the hearts of all in the golden net of his good will 
 and good understanding, as if life were but for him the rippling chant of 
 his favourite song, — 
 
 ' Gente, e qui V uccellatore.' " 
 
 Severn enjoyed an exceptionally wide acquaintanceship ; 
 and one of the best tests of his worth is the unanimity of 
 the high opinion of him held by all with whom he came in 
 contact. It is no small thing to have won so much friend- 
 ship, such high esteem. Yet below all is his supreme claim 
 to remembrance. Neither the patronage of the great, the 
 friendship of the most potent statesman of modern times, 
 nor the panegyric of the most eloquent of all contemporary 
 writers, could do for the memory of Joseph Severn what has 
 been accomplished once and for all by his loving service 
 and unswerving loyalty to Keats. It is one of the most 
 beautiful episodes in literary history, and doubtless there 
 are some who have won the crown of laurel who would barter 
 their fame for such a consecration in the minds of men. 
 
 It was a long life, and well spent in the main. On his 
 death-bed Keats bequeathed to Severn all the joy and 
 prosperity which ought to have been his but never could be ; 
 and it seems to one, looking over the record of these busy 
 and varied five-score years and more since the beloved 
 friend was laid below the violets he loved so well, that the 
 destinies which sometimes seem controllable by human will 
 had hearkened to the solemn bequest of the dying poet. 
 
 After the entry in the Diaries, quoted above— that telling 
 how, a few weeks before his death in his eighty-sixth year, 
 
280 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 he projected a new Keats picture — there are but three other 
 entries. One is under the date 15th May, and consists of 
 a stanza from a religious poem. The others were written on 
 the 1st and 7th of June, merely to say that the writer is 
 weaker. " Fine weather at last " are the latest written words- 
 of one whose life's weather was fine throughout its long 
 range from dawn to set. 
 
 He died quietly, and as if pleasantly tired, on Sunday,, 
 the 3rd of August, 1879. One of the latest words on his 
 lips was " Keats," for to the last he was preoccupied with 
 thoughts of the new picture he wished to paint, 'Keats 
 lying calm in death, and a beautiful spirit bending over 
 him.' 
 
 It was a pleasure to him to think, in what he knew to be 
 his fatal weakness, that he would be buried near the two- 
 poets whose genius he so revered, and with whose graves, as- 
 he said once, he was more familiar than with any mortal 
 habitation. Fortunately, he was unaware of, or had forgotten,, 
 a recent Roman law which necessitated the interment of 
 Protestant foreigners elsewhere than in the Gimeterio di 
 Monte Teslaccio* But though buried in the newer cemetery, 
 his body was removed thence two years later, and laid 
 beside that of his friend. Lord Houghton, the Archbishop of 
 Dublin, and other influential friends did their utmost to 
 bring this about, and to raise a suitable commemorative 
 stone over the new grave. The consent of the. Roman, 
 Government was obtained for the first ; for the second, there 
 was no difficulty as to funds the moment the rumour of the 
 project reached England and America : so little that there 
 was no real need of the circulars which were issued.f Lord 
 
 * Commonly and mistakenly spoken of as the old Protestant cemetery, 
 and ; still more mistakenly, as the English, cemetery. It is a cosmopolitan 
 burial-ground, and the English dead are only a proportion among the- 
 American, German, Scandinavian, French, Dutch, Spanish, Eussian, 
 and even Asiatic. There are probably as many Germans buried here 
 as there are English ; officially too, it is under the charge of the German 
 
 t It was well, however, to draw attention to the fact that Severn had 
 other claims to remembrance : — " But Joseph Severn, besides being the 
 ■ friend of Keats,' has additional claims to be remembered with honour in 
 
SELECTIONS FOB SEVERN'S GRAVESTONE. 281 
 
 Houghton, who had already expressed a wish that Seven l 
 should be buried on one side of Keats, and he, in due time, 
 on the other, so that the poet should lie " between his 
 friend and biographer," was to come from Athens to conduct 
 the ceremonial. Sudden illness prevented his arrival in 
 time, and his place was taken by Mr. T. Adolphus Trollope, 
 who, on the forenoon of a day early in March, spoke a few 
 appropriate words to the large number of Severn's friends 
 and Keats's admirers which had assembled, notwithstanding- 
 dull and threatening weather. There was none present who 
 did not realise that poetic justice was fulfilled. Keats and 
 Shelley lay but a brief space apart from each other ; beside 
 the elder poet, his friend Trelawny, beside the younger, 
 Joseph Severn. 
 
 This beautiful graveyard near the ancient Ostian Gate was 
 ever a spot wherein Severn loved to wander and meditate. 
 Strangely enough, except at the last, he does not seem to 
 have felt assured that in death as in life his fortune would 
 be consistent, and that his dust would mingle with that of 
 his friend. 
 
 "Sow and plant twice as much; extend the poet's do- 
 main ; for, as it was so scanty during his short life, surely it 
 ought to be yielded to him twofold in his grave." So he 
 had said to the custodian of the cemetery of Monte Testaccio 
 when, on his return from his long absence from Home, he 
 learned how constantly the violets were plucked from off 
 Keats's grave. To Joseph Severn himself a fortunate destiny 
 has yielded twofold. 
 
 It would be unnecessary to give all the proposals as to 
 the inscription to be made on Severn's tomb, offered by 
 eminent men and women of letters. It will suffice to select 
 
 the city which was his home during half a century. In his consular 
 capacity (and till 1870 he was also deputy Sardinian Consul) he earned 
 the lasting gratitude of many who benefited by his large-hearted and 
 never-failing benevolence ; including many Italian political prisoners and 
 exiles whose restoration to the joys of liberty and of family life he was 
 mainly instrumental in procuring during the late Pontificate; for which 
 important services he received the well-earned distinction of ' Officer of 
 the Order of the Crown of Italy ' from King Victor Emmanuel." 
 
282 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 one or two from the most distinguished. That from Lord 
 Houghton may be given first, as the one finally adopted 
 and now cut in the stone. " To the memory of Joseph 
 Severn, Devoted Friend and Deathbed Companion of John 
 Keats, whom he lived to see numbered among the Immortal 
 Poets of England. An Artist eminent for his Representa- 
 tions of Italian Life and Nature. British Consul at Eome 
 from 1861 to 1872 : And Officer of the Crown of Italy, In 
 recognition of his services to Freedom and Humanity." 
 At first Lord Houghton thought the inscription should be 
 in Latin. He wrote : " I have a notion that the inscription 
 should be in Latin. If you think so too, I should get it 
 composed by a competent hand ; if you prefer English, I 
 will try my own." In a note, dated 1st of November, 1881, 
 the Poet-Laureate suggested " To the Memory of Joseph 
 Severn, the Devoted Friend of John Keats, by whose death- 
 bed he watched and whose name he lived to see inscribed 
 among those of the Immortal Poets of England " (" and the 
 rest as Lord Houghton's "). Dante Gabriel Rossetti thought 
 that nothing could be more appropriate than Severn's own 
 pathetic words telling of his ministration to Keats (beginning 
 " Poor Keats has me ever by him "). In his letter he objects 
 to the phrase in Mr. Walter Severn's suggestion, " In their 
 death they were not divided." " Excuse my saying that 
 the suggestion of the words ' In their death they were not 
 divided,' must seem highly inappropriate to any one who 
 recollects the original application of the phrase, viz., to Saul 
 and Jonathan, who died on the same battlefield ; whereas 
 nearly sixty years elapsed between Keats's death and your 
 father's." * Mr. Palgrave, not the least of whose several 
 
 * The following note from Archbishop Trench to Mr. Walter Severn 
 indicates an omission — not " everything else " — in Gabriel Eossetti's pro- 
 posal ; but it is more worthy of quotation because of its protest against what 
 so many must have felt the intolerable incongruity of the acrostical epitaph 
 by General Sir Vincent Eyre which, with the accompanying and altogether 
 unnecessary carved laurel wreath on the medallion let into the right side 
 of the doorway to the cemetery, obtrusively affronts the visitor to the 
 newer of the two old Aliens' cemeteries — for two they are. (That where 
 Shelley lies was made in 1765 : that where Keats, Severn, Augustus W. 
 Hare, and others are buried, was opened in 1822. Henceforth there 
 
SELECTIONS FOB SEVERN'S GRAVESTONE. 283 
 
 claims to high consideration is his scholarly and in 
 every way delightful edition of Keats's poetry, proposed 
 simply "To the Memory of Joseph Severn, the Friend 
 of John Keats, By whose death-bed he sate, comforting, 
 and by whom, long since remembered high among the 
 Poets of England, Friend by Friend, he is now laid in 
 death." 
 
 It is strange that to no one seems to have occurred 
 the memorable phrase in Shelley's dedicatory preface 
 to the ' Adonais ' : " May the unextinguished Spirit of 
 his illustrious friend .... plead against Oblivion for 
 his name." 
 
 Finally, in this connection, may be quoted a letter from a 
 relative of Mrs. Lindon (" Fanny Brawne "). Not only did 
 Miss Brawne long outlive Keats,, but she survived till late 
 in the century ; and, by a singular chance, this relative 
 ministered to Joseph Severn in his old age. The following 
 
 will not be allowed any burials within a mile of inhabited dwellings; 
 and the Roman municipality has decided that all interments will take 
 place in the Campo Verano, a Eonian graveyard over a hundred years old.) 
 
 " Broomfield, Wicklow, 
 
 "July 29, 1881. 
 " Dear Mr. Severn, — 
 
 " As you ask from me an opinion on the suggested epitaph, I will 
 not refuse to give it, though I should certainly not have volunteered it 
 unasked. 
 
 " Your father was himself a distinguished artist. He had too, in 
 difficult times of Italy, played his part there so well as to receive honour- 
 able recognition of his work. No doubt he counted it a rare felicity of 
 his life that he was able to minister to those last painful months of poor 
 Keats's life. This will endear him much to those to whom Keats is 
 dear — but this is very far from being the sole ground why he ought to 
 be had in remembrance. My objection to Dante Eossetti's proposed 
 epitaph is that it igDores everything else, and in this way is unjust to 
 your father's memory. 
 
 " Sir Vincent Eyre's acrostic is so thoroughly artificial, and qua 
 acrostic so thoroughly out of its place, that I have, I must confess, a strong 
 auticipatory misgiving as to any epitaph which should be the work of the 
 same hand — but this observation is entirely for yourself. I am strong to 
 believe that in the inscription which you have yourself prepared will be 
 found what will best become the place and the occasion — and I would 
 earnestly advise not" to seek abroad what you will best find at home. I 
 am ever, 
 
 "Very faithfully yours, 
 
 " E. 0. Dubmn." 
 
284 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 letter explains itself : " I see by the Italia that you have- 
 arrived in Eome, with your father's old friend, Lord 
 Houghton " (this was a premature announcement on the 
 part of the Italia) " for the touching ceremony of placing 
 your father's remains near the friend of his youth, as he, too, 
 had always expressed the wish for, as well as being sur- 
 rounded with violets, a flower and perfume he delighted in. 
 They and the rose were his favourite flowers, and often and 
 often I have taken them to him when he was no longer able 
 to go out and see them blooming in the gardens. . . I have 
 ordered my clerk, Signor Framminghi, to be the bearer of 
 this note and to receive your wishes respecting the ' Souvenirs 
 de Famille,' which Signorina Margherita, Dr. Valeriani's 
 sister, begged to give up to the different members of my 
 kind old friend's family. . . . One of my first thoughts on 
 returning home will be to place a wreath of violets on your 
 dear father's new resting-place." 
 
 When the news of Joseph Severn's death spread abroad 
 there was a wide and earnest expression of the general 
 sentiment with which he was regarded. To many it came 
 as a startling surprise that the deceased artist and ex-Consul,, 
 who died so late in the century as 1879, had been the 
 comrade of Keats. To the younger generation Keats seemed 
 to have so long " dwelt in the abode where the Eternal are," 
 that it was difficult at once to grasp the fact that his intimate 
 friend had lived to a period when the personal tradition of 
 ' Adonais,' and Shelley, and Coleridge, of Byron, and even 
 Sir Walter Scott, had almost ceased to exist. 
 
 Soon after his return to Rome in 1861, forty years after 
 Keats's death, he wrote : " I am now engaged on a picture of 
 the poet's grave, and am treating it with all the picturesque 
 advantages which the antique locality gives me, as well as 
 the elevated associations which this poetic shrine inspires. 
 The classic story of Endymion being the subject of. Keats's 
 principal poem, I have introduced a young Eoman shepherd 
 sleeping against the headstone, with his flock about him, 
 whilst the moon from behind the pyramid illuminates his 
 figure and serves to realise Keats's favourite theme in the 
 
SEVERN AND EIS CONTEMPORARIES. 285 
 
 presence of his grave. This incident is not fanciful, but is 
 what I actually saw on an autumn evening at Monte 
 Testaccio the year following the poet's death." 
 
 There, sixty-one years after the death of the friend with 
 whom his name is immortally associated, he, too, was laid to 
 rest. Side by side they lie in that sunlit grassy spot, 
 darkened but once daily by the moving shadow of the 
 pyramid of Caius Cestius. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
APPENDIX. 289 
 
 Appendix to Chapter VII. 
 
 ( Vide p. 159, ct seq.) 
 
 " Within this first year of my marriage a most agitating and ferocious 
 persecution was got up against me through the agency of a man who was 
 husband to my servant Teresa. She had been with me six years, and as 
 my house was the large upper story of a surpressed monastery (in the 
 Vicolo dei Maroniti) I allowed her to live with her husband and baby in 
 my house. Her services were good, as she had been cook in a convent ; 
 a matter of importance to me, as my health had long been so delicate 
 that the ordinary Italian cookery did not suit me. But on my marriage 
 I was guilty of sad want of foresight in keeping on this said Teresa and 
 her husband, for in a short time their conduct became so bad and dis- 
 honest that I was obliged to turn them away. I had scarcely done so, 
 when lo! a law document was sent to me from the man, Giovanni 
 Bartolomei, demanding seven years' wages on the preposterous plea of his 
 having been my servant during that period. This he never was at any 
 time, unless occasionally helping his wife constituted service. I had 
 recommended him to all my friends, and he was commonly employed as a 
 porter. This false and ungrateful charge was sustained by a large com- 
 pany of witnesses ! Some of these perjurers declared that when making a 
 door for me they had heard me undertake to give this man six crowns a 
 month, and they even presumed to verify this by affirming that this 
 happened on the 1st October, 1823. On looking over my papers I found 
 that at the time they deposed to my making this agreement in Borne, I 
 was at Venice with Charles Brown, and deeply occupied, and uninter- 
 ruptedly resident there during my sojourn! To substantiate this I 
 produced my passport for the occasion, which I had preserved, and also 
 to prove their testimony doubly false I was able to show the lease of the 
 altogether different tenancy which at that time I held: that is, while 
 according to their deposition, they overheard me at my house in Vicolo 
 dei Maroniti, I was really the tenant of the house in the Via S. Isidoro, 
 more than a mile from the house these false witnesses had supposed me 
 occupying when they made their rash statement ! Having thus by the 
 production of these documents so completely established an alibi, and 
 disproved the perjurers, the judge, Signor Manari, requested a private 
 interview with me. He received me with assumed kindness and open- 
 ness, shaking hands with me in what I thought a queer ambiguous 
 manner. He addressed me in very bad English, upon which, perceiving 
 
290 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 I did not understand a word, he went on with his explanation in Italian. 
 The burden of this was, ' that the whole affair of Bartolomei was nothing 
 less than a conspiracy against me, and that he should forthwith give the 
 sentence in my favour.' Of course I was not a little surprised at this 
 unexpected honour of being so markedly favoured by the judge, and on 
 his own solicitation. I then left, and though vaguely surprised at the 
 expression on the judge's face, I was about to conclude that I had been 
 grossly prejudiced against Eoman justice, when lo ! and behold, I shortly 
 received the astounding notice that the same judge, the moment I had 
 turned my back, pronounced the sentence against Trie ! But the explana- 
 tion is more astounding than the fact. It is as follows : Signor Manari 
 on shaking hands with me (which I thought odd both as to the act and 
 in the manner) expected to find a bribe. His hand was of course in- 
 voluntarily shaped for the occasion, and not finding a bribe from me he 
 felt that in the nature and business of Boman justice he must have one 
 from some one : and so he recalled the other party, instructed them to 
 put forward an entire new evidence (dating it a year later, so as to 
 correct their former error in time and place !) and then obliged them to 
 swear to it. Then at once, without hearing my second defence, he gave 
 the verdict against me, and sentenced me to pay 428 crowns (about £100) 
 and all costs. I confess I was completely overcome for the moment at 
 this base way of the judge entrapping me ; for much as I had been 
 surprised at his begging the interview, and never having even dreamed it 
 was to the end that I might bribe him, yet I did not suppose such a 
 corrupt tribunal existed in Europe or possibly could exist. I should 
 mention that all the evidence was written and all got up by the lawyers, 
 the witnesses having nothing to do but to swear to it, which on every 
 occasion they did without a demur. Finding myself in this dilemma and 
 in a foreign country, and rather than be robbed by such a judge and such 
 a set of vagabonds, I determined to make a stand, for I happened to have 
 the sum in question at liberty, and that gave me more nerve to hold out. 
 Having, moreover, along with ample leisure, plenty of patience and a 
 calm temperament, I got in order most formidable opposition, which, if 
 it did not defeat (nothing could ever defeat such infamy but annihila- 
 tion of the whole Papal government), certainly suspended the sentence, 
 and enabled me to appear not only as a martyr to Boman justice, but 
 also as the advocate of an entire new judicial system. To this end I 
 presented myself to the newly-made English Prince of the Church, 
 Cardinal Weld ; of whose uprightness and goodness I had heard some- 
 thing from everyone. As I was indirectly known to His Eminence by 
 my intimacy with several Catholics at the English College, and more parti- 
 cularly with Lord and Lady of Wardour (sic), he received me very kindly 
 and even graciously. Without hesitation, though with evident pain, he 
 listened to my account of the unjust conspiracy and trial. He took up 
 my cause, supposing with me that his dignity and rank as a Boman 
 Prince would enable him to get me justice, for I did not want favour. 
 But this proved an unfounded surmise. Of such an inveterate nature 
 
APPENDIX. 291 
 
 was the flood of Roman iniquity, and so completely had it grown up into 
 'a wrong right' that not even the English Cardinal could stem the 
 degrading tide of universal corruption among the Papal officials. 
 
 " The first step taken in my favour through the Cardinal was the 
 granting to me of the right of appeal, and to take the cause into a new 
 court. The new judge, however, soon made it known that he would do 
 nothing but confirm the sentence. Fortunately by this time the whole 
 affair had been noised about, and the Eoman people were enchanted that 
 such a case had befallen an Englishman, as their vile tribunals would be 
 thus shown up to the world, and possibly reform be brought about owing 
 to pressure from without. Cardinal Weld was greatly puzzled and even 
 afflicted at the sad iniquity of things, and perhaps at the consequent 
 exposure, for by this time the matter was in every one's mouth, the 
 subject at every conversazione and at every cafe\ The Cardinal then 
 introduced me and my cause to the powerful Cardinal Odeschalchi, and I 
 was granted an interview in company with my Eoman advocate. Some 
 short time before, my countrymen had kindly offered to subscribe the 
 whole sum and present it to me, as I had done a public good, and as they 
 wished to have the case published in all the European papers. This 
 offer I had declined, both because I could afford with so much entertain- 
 ment to lose the money, and as I did not wish to place myself in personal 
 danger; and also because I was most satisfied with the kindness and 
 candour of Cardinal Weld. The result of the above interview was that 
 the Cardinal Odeschalchi finished by advising me " to accept the subscrip- 
 tion money discreetly, and when they came upon me for permission to 
 publish the case in the European newspapers, to pretend that I had never 
 so understood it.' He advised me, in a word, ' to fill my purse with 
 money, to get it honestly if I could, but at all events to get it.' I 
 thanked His Eminence, but shook my head : and when I told Cardinal 
 Weld the result he simply said quietly, ' That would never do, for your 
 countrymen would send you to Coventry.' 
 
 " At this time Chevalier Bunsen, the Prussian Minister, as my friend, 
 and Acton as Cardinal Weld's friend, came forward warmly to assist me. 
 The first spoke directly to the Pope, and made His Holiness quite aware 
 of the scandal it was to the Eoman government at this particular moment 
 when reform was being talked of. The Pope thereupon offered to pay 
 . me back the whole sum, by that time amounting to more than £150. On 
 refusal, through the Secretary of State, Monsignor Tosti, it was then 
 arranged that I was to have a new and fair trial : and it was explained 
 that the cause had been lost by my lawyer's mistake. When Bar- 
 tolomeis witnesses, I was told, swore that I owed the money, I should, 
 instead of proving that the man was not my servant, have sworn that I 
 had paid the money, and should have outnumbered the other side's 
 witnesses in swearing to this. The Pope's own Secretary of State actually 
 wrote a letter to M. Kestner, Hanoverian Minister, expressing this most 
 scandalous opinion ! It was at last arranged that my counsel was to 
 prepare a new brief of the whole case, and that the judge was to wait 
 
 U 2 
 
292 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 until a certain day, a Thursday evening, I remember. This engagement 
 was made with Chevalier Bunsen, M. Kestner, and also Sir Brook Taylor, 
 ■who had meanwhile arrived in Borne on a mission from the English 
 Government to endeavour to bring about some reform in the Boman 
 Courts of Justice. Sir Brook Taylor, on finding this case of mine so 
 applicable to the business on his hands, took it up with much energy. 
 These gentlemen thought they had arranged it all satisfactorily, and that 
 it would be well got through, when, to the astonishment of all, on the 
 "Wednesday (one day before the day agreed on) the judge, contrary to 
 his engagement so seriously made, pronounced the sentence against me and 
 ordered immediate execution for the money ! It was then I had recourse 
 to Monsignor Acton, who was Supreme Judge. He desired me to defer 
 paying the money, but to let the legal officials return and seize whatever 
 they liked — which they did, taking down my pictures and packing them 
 up for sale. There was one, ' The Sicilian Mariner's Hymn,' that I had 
 just done for the Marquis of Northampton, and the colours being still 
 fresh I was fearful that it might receive some serious injury, and so I 
 pretended it belonged to Cardinal Weld. It was not a little amusing to 
 see how the fellows drew back in sacred horror from touching it, when 
 the Cardinal's name was mentioned. These pictures of mine having been 
 taken away, Monsignor Acton requested I would nominally redeem them 
 with something not liable to injury, and I did so with the gold medallion 
 given by the Boyal Academy of London. Having done this, Monsignor 
 Acton called before him all these false witnesses, with Bartolomei at 
 their head, and he got them to confess that they knew quite well that 1 
 did not owe the money and that their head man was not my servant, and 
 more, that I was an excellent person, hut that they were all poor men and 
 so deserved to gain ! The Monsignor upon this asked them how much 
 they would take, and in the end the original sum was brought down to 
 half! So finished the illegal part of this affair, which, from first to last, 
 dragged on through nearly three years, and cost me £95. At the end of 
 all this turmoil I was glad to find myself, if a loser in some respects, in 
 many other respects a great gainer, for I had not only won for myself the 
 esteem and friendship of so many persons I looked up to, but also I had 
 many excellent commissions given me, the principal one being from 
 Cardinal Weld himself, who had seen my sketch of the ' Bevelations ' 
 subject, and who ordered the large picture as he said, 'of the patient' 
 artist.' 
 
 " This scandalous affair was never thoroughly cleared up. No one 
 could tell from what source the money came for Bartolomei's ability to 
 sustain his case, for money he had in plenty. Many of my friends sus- 
 pected it came indirectly from my old enemy, and certainly I confess 
 that I could not guess who else could have cared to spend so much 
 money upon me, or who had it to spend in such a way. I think, 
 perhaps, that Cardinal Weld may have known the truth, but kindly 
 concealed it from me." 
 
APPENDIX. 293 
 
 II. 
 
 Appendix to Page 168. 
 
 " One of the pleasantest things I ever had said to me, and said in the 
 simplest and most unaffected manner, was the reply of Cardinal Weld on 
 hearing the iniquitous decision of the Judge in my law-suit. The whole 
 sum that I was calculated to lose by this sentence of priestly injustice, 
 was about £150 ; and as 1 had for some time determined to execute a 
 large altar-piece from my Apocalypse sketch (twelfth chapter of Revela- 
 tions) and trust to my good fortune for the sale of it, this monstrous 
 sentence cut me off from all hope of doing such a work by depriving me 
 of all the means I had in reserve for such an expensive enterprise. The 
 Cardinal had seen the sketch several times and greatly admired it, and 
 he had known my intention of doing it on the large scale, indeed of 
 having actually begun it. 
 
 " When I told him of the result of the trial and the sum that I should 
 lose, and that the consequence would be that this altar-piece must fall to 
 the ground, he said, ' no, the world cannot afford to lose that — you 
 must do it for me ; ' and, taking my hand most kindly, he turned away 
 his face, unable to conceal his emotion. This generous feeling towards 
 me continued unabated to the moment of his death, although there were 
 so many painful circumstances militating against his friendship towards 
 me — for of the patronage of this liberal Prelate the extreme Papist party, 
 
 with Monsignor at its head, had become jealous and even 
 
 malicious. The English Catholics, not having on their side any Eoman 
 Catholic artist at Home to compete with me, and as I resisted all their 
 attempts at conversion, the bitterness inspired was most singular and 
 revolting. It extended so far that at times Lord Clifford thought it his 
 duty to tell me, and in every way to put me on my guard. During the 
 lifetime of Cardinal Weld this was not of so much consequence, for I had 
 not so many opportunities of observing it. 
 
 " The Cardinal came frequently to see my progress in my work, and 
 perhaps no picture was ever executed under more peasant or even 
 favourable circumstances. It was wholly my own invention and choice, 
 and at the same time I had the delight of carrying out my conception 
 with the added guidance of this generous and illustrious, patron. I 
 should here mention that His Eminence never once inquired what the 
 price would be, or how long the work would take me to do. Once he 
 told me not to hurry it or inconvenience myself, for he could sincerely 
 assure me of the great pleasure it gave him to see me occupied on such a 
 work. He always repeated to me the praises he heard from foreigners 
 during the progress of my work. Personally he was very attentive to 
 
294 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 me, and frequently invited me to dine with him, and, having a fine taste 
 in music, I often had the whole attention bestowed upon me — for he 
 performed on the French horn with great delicacy and expression — and 
 on every occasion after dinner he requested me to play an accompaniment 
 to him on the piano. This music after a while was considered to be not 
 quite in accordance with the dignity and gravity of his high position as 
 a Dignitary of the Eoman Church, and His Eminence was invited to 
 leave off playing the French horn ; which, with charming gentlemanlike 
 simplicity, he confessed to me. Before I knew him, and when Lady 
 Clifford, his daughter, was alive, he was guilty of the sad scandal of going 
 about with her in his carriage. Such a thing had never been seen before 
 in the streets of Eome, and was soon stopped. No doubt it pleased and 
 tranquillised all the priestly party, up to the Pope himself, when it pleased 
 Providence to take away this only dear child on whom the Cardinal's 
 affection was too much placed. Even the least rigorous considered the 
 circumstance as unseemly. 
 
 " My having such a patron and painting such a picture was the source 
 of not only much happiness to me and my wife, but it also enabled me to 
 do many essential acts of charity to, and otherwise help my countrymen, 
 particularly young artists ; and the good Cardinal on all such occasions 
 was very encouraging to me, and assured me that I never gave him 
 trouble. Although in itself so slight an incident, one of the most 
 memorable instances for me was that of Sir Edward Lytton Bulwer, who, 
 when at Eome in 1832, was composing and writing his novel of Rienzi. 
 He expressed to me his great surprise that he could not get a * Gibbon' 
 in Eome, and I confessed to him that I had one, but could not lend it to 
 him, as I had received it through the kindness of Cardinal Weld, and 
 had promised that I would never lend it, as it was a prohibited book. I 
 confided the circumstances to the Cardinal, and, on my undertaking for 
 myself and Sir E. Lytton Bulwer the utmost discretion, he kindly gave 
 me permission to lend the ' Gibbon ' to Sir Edward. 
 
 " About this time an incident of a serious nature took place which I 
 really conjectured would at once deprive me of all the esteem and 
 patronage of the Cardinal. On all occasions when a convert was on the 
 
 carpet the priests of the English College, particularly Monsignor 
 
 and Dr. B , made it their object to call on me and tell me 
 
 the fact, no doubt in the hope that I might be induced to follow the 
 example set me, for at times there was a great dearth of respectable 
 converts — indeed they were mostly of such ambiguous character 
 that we were induced to call them 'convicts' instead of converts. 
 But on the particular occasion I am leading up to, one of better 
 sort as to his circumstances (for the others were mostly needy and 
 
 did the thing for a certain pension) appeared. His name was D , 
 
 and he was a Yorkshireman with two thousand a year. I had as 
 a married man, been frequently warned against him, on account of 
 his having introduced drunken and dissolute customers amongst my 
 artist friends, such as were in every way undesirable, and in some 
 
APPENDIX. 295 
 
 instances tended to undermine promising artistic careers and good 
 standing. This had been going on for more than a year. One day 
 
 Doctor B called to tell me that Mr. D was about to be baptised 
 
 by Cardinal Weld, he having been for some weeks a convert. As I knew 
 the man to be a great reprobate, I told the priestly Doctor that it gave 
 
 me much pleasure, as Mr. D would now no doubt change his life in 
 
 changing his religion, and that I had lamented the dissolute ways he had 
 introduced amongst my artist friends. He replied that ' On the contrary, 
 he was changing his religion that he might get rid of his dissolute artist 
 friends.' I was surprised at this slander, for I am sure a better set of 
 
 men never existed than the English artists at Kome until this Mr. D 
 
 appeared ; and I told Dr. B so, but he persisted in his false opinion, 
 
 which he well knew was false, as he had been long personally acquainted 
 with most of the artists and could judge for himself. But he was guilty 
 
 of the sad and singular meanness of going straight to Mr. D and 
 
 putting his own words as it were in my mouth, and told him that I had 
 
 just said ' that he (Mr. D ) was changing his religion that he might 
 
 be quit of his dissolute artist friends.' Mr. D , who in the midst of 
 
 all his vices, was manly in his bearing, flew into a violent rage at this, 
 and by the aid of a new English convert, Count Hawkis Le Grice (sic), 
 
 sent me a challenge. Of course I appealed to Dr. B , who in the 
 
 coolest manner persisted in his falsehood, and as there was no compelling 
 testimony from, and no satisfaction to be demanded of, a priest, I was 
 obliged to accept the challenge, which I did on the second day after 
 
 seeing Dr. B . 
 
 " All my friends knew and believed in my statement — indeed I was 
 gratified at the way they all rallied round me and relied on me ; but yet 
 
 it was my duty to render satisfaction to Mr. D for the injurious 
 
 expressions I had been charged with uttering against him, and which, as 
 I was in the toils of a priest, I had no way of disproving. Nearly a week 
 
 passed without action on my part, till Mr. D indirectly made known 
 
 to me that he would waylay me unless I gave him satisfaction. I was 
 in some danger, for he was a kind of bull of a man, and could easily have 
 annihilated me ; so there was nothing but to try and match him with 
 
 what little wit I might chance to have. Dr. B had pointedly denied 
 
 that he had ever said ' that Mr. D ! s motives were to get rid of his 
 
 dissolute artist friends ' ; but on the fifth day I thought of something 
 that would make me a match for the priest and the bull. I wrote the 
 following note to Mr. D : 
 
 "'Dear Sib,— 
 
 " ' I regret exceedingly that I should have been made the in- 
 strument of slandering you in assuming that your change of religion 
 was to rid yourself of your dissolute artist friends, when I am now so 
 
 thoroughly convinced that that is not the case, since Dr. B himself 
 
 denies it and thus denies his own words — but I am willing to render you 
 any and every satisfaction on my part, as I never believed the assertion. 
 
296 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 and this you will find from every one of our mutual friends. I 
 remain,' etc. 
 
 " This gave the highest satisfaction to Mr. D , who wrote me ex- 
 pressing his thanks for my • magnanimous generosity.' Dr. B was 
 
 content to get out of the scrape, though at the expense of being called a 
 liar, which he could well afford as a priest. Every one of my friends 
 
 was delighted. After this I discovered that Cardinal had got 
 
 hold of Mr. D for the purpose of marrying him to his sister, Miss 
 
 , and to this end he was baptised and was to be created Duke of 
 
 Viterbo ! The above affair and Dr. B 's duplicity opened the eyes of 
 
 Mr. D , and he went straight away from all the objects of the Church. 
 
 Cardinal , being aware that Mr. D had a kind of seraglio of 
 
 Eoman ladies, thought it would be a little awkward as regards the 
 marriage of his sister, so he delicately and indirectly proceeded to get all 
 the 'ladies' arrested and put into San Michele for the time being! The 
 
 bull at this went forth raving to the house of Cardinal and accused 
 
 the Cardinal and priests of being like himself in everything except in 
 charity, and in fact behaved in such a way that Lord Clifford had to call 
 all the men-servants to take him out of the house, which with great 
 difficulty they did, and only with help of Cardinal Odeschalchi's servants 
 to assist, who had been attracted downstairs by the roaring of the bull. 
 This affair did not surprise me, for I had observed at the musical parties 
 
 of Cardinal , where Mr. D and Miss- ■ were often seated 
 
 together, that he was not in any way a person for decent society, his 
 conduct being somewhat similar to what it must have been in the company 
 of his ' ladies.' 
 
 " At this blow-up all Borne was in amusement, for Cardinal , Lord 
 
 Clifford, the Pope, &c, insisted on the English Consul, Mr. Freeborn, at 
 
 once making out Mr. D 's passport. For some very clever reasons 
 
 the Consul declined, and such were the facts of the law that the Eoman 
 
 Catholic party could not legally send away Mr. D . He remained five 
 
 weeks in Borne after this, and during his stay acted a mock mass and all 
 kind of impieties as well as immoralities. He then departed for Leghorn, 
 where he died of brandy, having made a Protestant will (sic). This sad 
 
 affair, which must have cost Cardinal Weld much pain, and Cardinal 
 
 intense chagrin, and in which I was a chief actor, threatened to cut me 
 
 off from His Eminence, or at least such was my fear. But after Mr. D 
 
 had gone, and it had all died away, I received an invitation to dine with 
 Cardinal Weld. I was at first alarmed at all the company talking of my 
 
 'bull' (they talked Italian), but when on the mention of Mr. D 's 
 
 name the Cardinal's eye caught mine and I saw him smile, I was convinced 
 by that smile he approved of my conduct. Still, as I had been all along 
 shown up as a persecutor of converts, I thought it likely he would have to 
 
 strike me off from the list of his friends. The conduct of Cardinal 
 
 was very mean, for he sacrificed his sister's respectability, and made 
 himself and her the derision of all the Italians and English then in Borne. 
 
APPENDIX. 297 
 
 This was one amongst many of the awkward scenes I had to encounter 
 and appear in (though none so bad as this), which my position as the 
 ■protege of Cardinal Weld, placed me in. But I could well afford to 
 laugh at these minor inconveniences, for the Cardinal's kindness remained 
 unimpaired until the moment of his death, and then I had to bear up 
 against a load of malice and persecution in so many shapes and disguises 
 that I was at times otf my guard. One of the first charges was that I was 
 cheating Cardinal Weld in getting an enormous price for my picture, on 
 the ground of my pretending to him that I should become a convert; 
 but I was able to make the proud answer, ' that not only was the price 
 of the altar-piece never asked, mentioned, or fixed, when the picture was 
 commissioned; but also that the Cardinal had never on any occasion 
 talked about conversion in any way.' In this I was borne out by Lord 
 Clifford. Then the assumed actual sum was mentioned in the Dublin 
 Review, which amazed me not a little, as no sum whatever at the time 
 was stipulated or even mentioned. But the hardest blow at me was 
 attempted by the Pope himself; for Cardinal Weld, hearing my picture 
 so well and so much complimented by foreigners, had thought of the plan 
 of making it a public work, by presenting it the Pope to be placed in the 
 Cathedral of ' St. Paul beyond the walls ' then rebuilding, and on the 
 part of His Holiness it was most graciously accepted (though without 
 having been seen). The death of Cardinal Weld was doubly painful and 
 terrible to me, for in addition to the losing of so dear a friend I soon had 
 cause to suspect that a conspiracy existed against me to prevent me from 
 ever placing my picture in the church. How to defeat or counteract this 
 taxed my imagination more than the invention of the picture. I had 
 long suspected, and soon foresaw, that a host of enemies were up in 
 
 arms against me, with Cardinal at their head; yet I could not 
 
 conceive that they aimed at the exclusion of my altar-piece from the 
 church the destination the late Cardinal had found for it, and one 
 approved by His Holiness the Pope. Yet every kind of symptom pre- 
 sented itself, and I must indeed have been blind to all the priestly human 
 nature not to have been at once aware of it. In quiet, or assumed quiet, 
 uncertainty, and patience I went on enquiring from the various persons 
 concerned in the Cardinal's will, how and when and where I should be 
 allowed to place my work in the church. Cardinal Acton took me on 
 one occasion to select a place, and he may have been sincere and 
 deceived by the many made-up appearances that so well deceived me. 
 He was a very religious man in his own creed, and had the name of a 
 great bigot, but I had received from him so much kind attention during 
 my scandalous trial against my servant's fellow perjurers that I could not 
 then, and do not now, think he was insincere. Yet our visit resulted 
 in nothing final, and, if it was not all pretence, it was like it in its 
 results. 
 
 " Of course so important an object as my picture becoming a public 
 work, the only one in Italy by an Englishman, was not to be upset or 
 laid aside even for awhile on my part without my utmost effort. But 
 
298 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 my opponents were such wolves in sheep's clothing that I had no course 
 hut a creeping one, pretending only to receive impressions, and relying 
 On the assumed generosity flaring up about me. 
 
 " The saddest and archest of my persecutors was Baron Cammucini, a 
 famous Eoman painter, who pretended to admire my altar-piece and to 
 be my most useful friend. When the time arrived for my leaving Eome 
 to educate my children in England, it was expedient that some real 
 steps should be decided on. I visited the Baron for this purpose, and he 
 volunteered his services to go the Pope on my behalf for the permission 
 to place my work in San Paolo F. M. He came to me after the 
 interview with His Holiness to assure me that he had satisfied the 
 Pope that my picture was in every way a work proper and suitable to 
 a Catholic Cathedral, and that His Holiness had expressed much kind 
 feeling about it, and left the matter to the Baron to carry out. This, 
 as he had so much admired and praised the work, and often assured me 
 that he had said the same to the Pope, ought to have contented me, but 
 it did not; for when the time came, he gave me for answer that the 
 architects were out of Borne, and that I must leave my picture in his 
 friendly hands, and that he would regard it more and have tenderer care 
 of it than his own works. 
 
 " This was not business-like, and I am sorry to say that I even did not 
 think it quite true. 
 
 " At this time the German artists, who were great admirers of my 
 works, and most sincere and obliging friends, gave me a public dinner, 
 at which was Signor Bernhardt, an aged artist in historical landscape, 
 and one who was of interest to me as having been the friend of Schiller. 
 At the finish of the dinner he asked, with some formality, what was 
 happening with my picture, and where it was ? I explained that nothing 
 had really been done, nor had I been able to decide on anything. Then 
 said he, 'I make you a little old man's advice, based en fifty years' 
 knowledge of Eome. Write to the Cardinal Tosti, President of the 
 Cathedral of St. Paul, and say in a few words as you can put it, ' that 
 unless he can at once allow you to place your picture in the church 
 according to the wishes and the gift of Cardinal Wield, you must at once 
 take it with you to England as you are responsible for its safety.' 
 
 " This I saw at a glance was deep advice, and as soon as I returned 
 home, wrote the letter in Italian and sent it without a moment's delay. 
 In a short time I received a visit from the Marquis Campana, who had 
 been sent by Cardinal Tosti to conciliate me. Being a most valued 
 friend, he was well selected. He told me that the thing was all so well 
 arranged, but that my rude epistle had spoilt everything, and that I 
 must at once write an apology to the Cardinal Tosti. 
 
 " I assured the Marquis that there was nothing of which I could he 
 ashamed in my letter; on the contrary it was the real truth, and 
 expressed what I should really do, viz. — ' take my picture away.' He 
 was grieved, and begged me to write again, which, as I was unable to do 
 right away, I begged him to show me in what form and how I should 
 
APPENDIX. 299 
 
 write. He complied and wrote an answer, in most elegant Italian, but 
 saying nothing conclusive. So I assured him as an Englishman I could 
 not send such a letter, indeed that I could not depart from what I 
 had written at first. Realising this, and that I was determined, he 
 kindly undertook to go back to the Cardinal and try and adjust the 
 thing. 
 
 " He returned and brought me an invitation to visit the Cardinal that 
 evening at once, although it was ten o'clock. I was received with great 
 politeness by His Eminence. He first enquired ' What could induce me 
 to return to England after twenty years' residence at Rome where I had so 
 much distinguished myself.' I told him it was the education of my four 
 children. He ,was surprised, and offered me the run of all the Roman 
 Universities and his own powerful help ; hut I assured him that that was 
 not my object ; that I wished them to grow up English in mind and body, 
 and have the advantages I had had. He then adverted to the picture, 
 and begged me to leave it with Baron Cammucini, and that they would 
 all have the greatest regard for it, and place it, and do all the fine 
 things for it that I could possibly desire.' Now all this kind of thing I 
 had heard over and over again ever since St. Paolo's had been consecrated 
 anew, while my picture was still left out, or remembered only to be 
 forgotten, and I too well knew that the time was come to have a real 
 business-like answer, and such an answer I was determined to have. 
 Perhaps I saw some little misgivings in the Cardinal's handsome counte- 
 nance that encouraged me in the idea that he was not altogether performing 
 the awkward affair quite to his own liking. So I at once told him that I 
 could not conscientiously consent to such an arrangement ; that I must 
 see the late Cardinal Weld's wishes truly and faithfully carried out, or 
 take the picture at once to England; and that what made the thing 
 imperative on my part was the expected arrival of Lord Clifford in Rome, 
 who, as the Cardinal's son-in-law and executor, would be sadly disturbed 
 at finding the late Cardinal's gift thrown on one side and treated with 
 marked disrespect. 
 
 " ' Indeed,' I added, ' that I could not believe His Holiness the Pope 
 would allow such a thing, as he so greatly esteemed the memory of 
 Cardinal Weld, and had so graciously accepted the gift of my picture, and 
 that the Cardinal had often told me of his conversations with His Holiness, 
 not only about the gift, but also about the subject of the picture.' 
 Cardinal Tosti was moved at this my appeal, and he said, ' Well, well, 
 you can place it for the present in the Sacristy, and as to its final destination 
 in the Church, that can be determined after the restorations in the church 
 are completed.' 
 
 " At this I was well content, and as my motto is ' to let well alone,' I 
 thanked His Eminence and wished him good-night and returned home to 
 sleep sound on my success. 
 
 " Early in the morning, before six o'clock, I received a visit from an 
 architect of the church ; he had come to receive my orders about placing 
 my picture in the Sacristy according to Cardinal Tosti's directions. ' But 
 
300 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 a change had come o'er my dream.' I had waked up with a bold idea, 
 and the architect's visit helped me. I said that I had determined not to 
 to place my work in the Sacristy, as Cardinal Weld's order was to place it 
 in the church, and to this purpose I at once pointed out to him a fine arch 
 in the church that would suit my picture in shape and light. He saw 
 nothing to prevent this place being thus occupied, and offered at once 
 to go back to the Cardinal to get his consent. The architect soon 
 returned, and surprised me with the longed-for permission, and the whole 
 arrangement was made at once. Before ten in the morning I arrived with 
 my picture and its ponderous carved frame, and plenty of workmen to 
 strain it and frame it at twelve. I had the high gratification not only of 
 seeing it raised up to its capital place, for which in secret I had longed for 
 three years, but also that the monks and priests of the church were much 
 struck with x my work and complimented me upon it. Indeed, I well 
 knew that if I could once succeed in placing it, the rest would follow. 
 And now the rich colouring of my picture and its attempt to revive the 
 fine old art, fascinated all the clergy present, and much as I knew they 
 had opposed it before they saw it, as a work of heresy and even blas- 
 phemy, so now it seemed to accord with all their extreme theological 
 theories wherein the earliest principle was triumphant. My happiness 
 was complete — my work was effective and in its place. I left crowds 
 admiring it who had been attracted to the church by the astounding fact 
 that the picture by a heretic had for the first time been placed in a 
 Catholic church. I had soon perceived by their cunning looks and signs 
 that I was gaming more credit by having placed it than even having 
 painted it, for I afterwards learned that the conspiracy against my picture 
 and myself was known to everybody, so that amongst the persons present 
 (and there were many artists) not only had I sympathy at having 
 overcome serious obstacles, but I had what was in the Italian eyes the 
 greater glory of having defeated the priests, from Monsignor Wiseman 
 downwards, and so, in some measure, having assisted the cause of Italy 
 and the Italians. On my way home I met the Duchess of Cambridge on 
 her way to be assured of the fact, besides numbers of my friends, Germans 
 as well as English. They all congratulated me on the wonderful fact, 
 which everyone said had appeared to them impossible to accomplish. 
 When I got home an astounding instance of Baron Cammucini's perfidy 
 awaited me. In accordance with my request of the day before, when he 
 had assured me that he would do his utmost, even more than he could do 
 for his own work, if it was necessary that I should leave it to his care, he 
 had now sent the Baroness to inform me that the architects of the church 
 were all away from Borne, that my picture could not possibly be put up, 
 or even taken there, and that I must leave it to his friendly care. My 
 wife explained that I was at thai moment with the chief Architect and his 
 assistants placing it in the church, and that the said Architect had oeen 
 twice with me that morning. The poor Baroness, finding herself the 
 bearer of such a vile falsehood, was much overcome, and nearly fainted, 
 and I was on my arrival not a little glad not to see her, or ever to see 
 
APPENDIX. 301 
 
 Baron Cammucini again, for I should have lost all my patience with a 
 man of such mean cunning. He wrote me a most complimentary letter 
 on the occasion, in which he fought shy of his own failure and depravity, 
 and assumed a total unconsoiousness of it. What a degradation of human 
 nature, for he was in an elevated position, and had failed, signally failed, 
 in a meanly jealous endeavour to exclude my altar-piece from the 
 Cathedral of St. Paul by hook or by crook. When I arrived in London I 
 heard all the details of this deep-laid conspiracy, which it was thought 
 was certain to demolish me and my picture. Afterwards I heard from 
 Rome that the Pope admired my work, and pronounced ' that the heretic 
 Englishman had produced one of the finest Madonnas he had ever seen.' 
 This high compliment I received through the Prince Santa Croce. 
 
 " As regards the future well-being of the picture I was aware that the 
 arch whereon I had placed it was only temporally bricked up, and that in 
 the course of time it would be opened to connect the transept with the 
 nave, for the transept being finished these arches were closed to remain 
 until the opening of the nave. This opening took place six years later, 
 and then it was expedient to remove my picture to the sacristy, where it 
 now remains, waiting, I believe, for a place in one of the chapels of the 
 nave now in progress. 
 
 " When I chance to meet Cardinal I fancy I see in his glance 
 
 a touch of shame (but a very slight one) for having failed (for it is in the 
 failure the sin is and not at all in the crime) in such a deep-laid plot. 
 He was in London at the moment I placed my picture, and I have always 
 regretted that I was so unfortunate as not to have had the first telling of 
 news to him and to have seen his mortification. I hear often of my 
 picture from travellers, and that it is well preserved and greatly improved 
 in tone and looks, and like a work of the fine old times in comparison to 
 the other two in the church, the ' Assumption of the Madonna,' by 
 Agricola, and the 'Conversion of Paul,' by Cammucini, both inferior 
 works, and inferior even to the usual efforts of these two artists." 
 
 ( Written during the period of Severn's residence in London.) 
 
 III. 
 
 Appendix to Chaptek XII. 
 A REMINISCENCE OF SEVERN. 
 
 The following brief note, written by Professor Eric Robertson, about the 
 period of Severn's interment beside Keats, is worthy of preservation as 
 the record of a stranger who saw the old artist in his last days. It is in 
 too subdued a tone to be a truthful portrait, but it is an interesting 
 impression. 
 
302 LIFE OF JOSEPH SEVERN. 
 
 " It is not two years since Joseph Severn, the friend of Keats, slipped 
 away noiselessly from the world. English visitors in Borne, attending a 
 concert at the Sala Dante, or buying prints at the G-overnment Stamperia, 
 or casting their luckpennies into the Fountain of Trevi, were few of them 
 aware that within a stone's-throw could be found a man full of memories 
 of a great English classic, the Jonathan of a sweet-singing David, who, 
 alas, never came to his throne ! 
 
 " Passing up the stairs of the Sala Dante, and traversing a dim carpet- 
 less gallery, Severn's visitors sought a most unpretending door, bespeaking 
 the intercession of a sweet, faint little bell that in its unworldly chime 
 seemed to strike the keynote of the abode, as one might say. When the 
 inmate's faithful attendant had responded to this appeal, it was necessary 
 to wait a few minutes while she ascertained whether Mr. Severn could 
 receive. It always appeared to cost her master some reflection before he 
 could decide upon seeing anybody. As if by way of apology for this 
 inevitable delay, the lobby was converted into a kind of ante-room, the 
 walls of which were hung with a few fine engravings. Severn set great 
 store upon one of these, a unique and exquisite rendering of the well- 
 known picture we have been allowed until lately to call Guido's ' Beatrice 
 Cenci.' 
 
 " The studio was sombre, and arranged with as little conventionality as 
 the painter himself, 'everything about him betokening a careless desola- 
 tion.' 'Desolation' is scarcely too strong a word to convey the impression 
 given by the chamber and its tenant. He dwelt entirely alone, apparently 
 from choice, for he had attached relatives and a large circle of warm 
 friends in England. 
 
 " The spectacle of this old and frail man, likely soon to drop into a 
 foreigner's grave, would have been sufficiently full of melancholy interest ; 
 but when one remembered him to be a relic of a time long gone by, and 
 heard him speak of nothing but a generation of dead men, one .had a sense 
 of 'death in lite' that quickened the whole effect into one of real desola- 
 tion. He knew little of the world as it existed around him : he lived in 
 the past. He could have shared the feeling of Lamb when he cried, 
 ' Hang posterity ! I write for antiquity.' Severn in the last year of his 
 life was still painting portraits of Keats, the beautiful boyish Keats of his 
 memory. He never tired of talking about his friend. He would lay 
 before you a volume of Shakespeare's poems, in the fly-leaf of which Keats 
 had scribbled his ' Last Sonnet.' Then you would learn that as Keats 
 and Severn were one day lying under becalmed sails in the Channel, the 
 poet grew quiet for a space, and by and by drew this volume from his 
 pocket and wrote some verses in it, and handed the book over to his 
 companion. It is in this sonnet that these fine lines occur : — 
 
 • And watching, with eternal lids apart, 
 Like Nature's patient sleepless Eremite, 
 The moving waters at their priestlike task 
 Of pure ablution round earth's human shores.' 
 
APPENDIX. 303 
 
 " David Vedder has a curiously similar thought : — 
 
 ' The ocean heaves resistlessly, 
 And pours his glistening treasures forth ; 
 His waves — the priesthood of the sea — ■ 
 Kneel on the shell-gemmed earth, 
 And there emit a hollow sound 
 As if they murmured praise and prayer.' 
 
 " From Keats's works the discussion mi;>ht pass to Keats's person, and 
 the painter would tell yon he considered Lord Houghton entirely in error 
 in writing of Keats's ' blue eyes.' If any man could talk with certainty of 
 their colour he himself could, and he could affirin that they had no tinge 
 of blue, but were a warm grey, almost brown. Thus occurred a sort of 
 Glaukopis-Athene dispute that Lord Houghton and Severn carried on in 
 private letters, Lord Hougbton to the last maintaining his description 
 unmodified. The painter had not a very exalted opinion of Fanny 
 Brawne, of whom he said the only true likeness was to be found in one of 
 the two figures in Titian's ' Sacred and Profane Love.' The pictures in 
 the studio, other than these portraits of Keats, had no great interest for the 
 amateur. 
 
 " One, of the ' Cana Marriage,' evinced a touch of genius in representing 
 the transformed water poured from one pitcher at first transparent as 
 crystal, but changing colour in its arc, like a rainbow, and descending red 
 into the other pitcher. Severn was proud of this idea. But it was 
 characteristic of the man that when he had painted in the miracle, with a 
 few sketchy figures in the background, he abandoned the design for a new 
 memory portrait of Keats at the age of eighteen. It would seem, indeed, 
 as if his connection with the famous, unfortunate poet had cast a shadow 
 over his life and caused his artistic vigour to droop. The world to him 
 was but a world that had lost Keats. Home itself, with its innumerable 
 associations, was to him but the grave of Keats. 
 
 ****** 
 
 " To the wall of the house in which Ke ats breathed his last at Home 
 there was recently attached a commemorative tablet. Severn was too 
 frail to assist at the simple ceremonial of unveiling it. "Who knows, but 
 that a greater veil now drawn aside, tlie laithfnl friend may see of the 
 man he loved something more than the empty name — may catch again 
 his well-remembered tones ? " 
 
 [e. s. e.] 
 
 From the Dublin University Review, vol. xcvi. 
 
( 304 ) 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Abbey, Me., 147 
 
 Acland, Sir Thos. D., 210 
 
 Acton, Cardinal, 292, 297 
 
 ' Adonais,' by Percy B. Shelley, 115, 
 117-22, 147, 213, 249, 250 
 
 Agricola, Signor, 191 
 
 Alfleri, poems by, 68 
 
 Ampthill, Lord, 214 
 
 Anglesea, Marquis of, 113 
 
 Angelo, Michael, 138, 190, 222-4 
 
 Ashburton, Lady, 210 
 
 Atlantic Monthly, The, see 'Lite- 
 rary Work ' of J. Severn. 
 
 Austria, Emperor of, 206 
 
 Azeglio, the Marquis of, 145, 146 
 
 Bailey, Benjamin, 194 
 Bartolomei, G., 289-292 
 Baynes, Capt., 149, 164 
 Beaumont, Sir George, 105, 114 
 Beaumont, Lady, 105 
 Bedford, Duke of, 146, 147, 152, 
 
 153, 205 
 Belgians, King of, see Leopold, 
 
 Prince 
 Berardi, Cardinal, 271, 272 
 Blake, William, 261 
 Bond, William, 6-9, 22, 26, 106, 
 
 109 
 Brawne, Fanny, 38, 43, 44, 75, 76- 
 
 80, 88, 98, 109, 119, 131, 160, 
 
 272-4, 283 
 Brawne, Mrs., 38, 43, 69, 75, 76, 
 
 84, 88-90, 98, 111 
 Braye, Baroness, 210 
 Brockman, Leopold, 251 
 Brown, Charles Armitage, 26, 28, 
 
 35, 38, 39, 42, 44, 47, 52, 53, 55, 
 
 62, 72-5, 86-8. 94, 97, 98, 103, 
 
 106-112, 127, 131, 132, 134-6, 
 
 Brown, C. A. — continued. 
 
 139, 142-4, 152, 156, 157, 159- 
 
 66, 170, 171, 174-6, 177-9, 183- 
 8, 191-8, 256, 260, 262-5, 272, 
 289 ; death of, 201 
 
 Brown, Charles, jun. (Carlino), 161, 
 
 191-3, 263 
 Browning, Robert, 262 
 Bryant, 274 
 
 Bulwer, Sir E. Lytton, 294 
 Bunsen, Baron, 180, 214, 216, 217, 
 
 291,292 
 Bunsen, Baroness, 217 
 Buonaparte, Princess, 82 
 Burgess, Rev., 123 
 Burghersh, Lord, 158 
 Burns, Robert, 30 
 Butler, S., 173 
 Byng, Admiral, 155 
 Byron, Lord, 30, 127,129, 131, 135, 
 
 136, 259, 264 
 Byron, George Gordon, 207, 208 
 
 Calcott, Mk. (R.A.), 138 
 
 Cambridge, Duchess of, 300 
 
 Cammucini, Baron, 298-301 
 
 Campana, Marquis, 298 
 
 Campbell, Mr., 103, 104 
 
 Canova, 50 
 
 Carlino, see Brown, Charles, jun. 
 
 Chatterton, 30 
 
 Clark, Dr. (Sir Andrew), 64, 65, 
 
 67, 69, 70, 75-80, 83-85, 89, 
 91-99, 102, 105-7, 110 
 
 Clark, Mrs., 80, 102 
 
 Clarke, Charles Cowden, 17, 110, 
 
 194,196,255-9,274 
 Clarke, Mary Cowden, 259, 260, 
 
 Clifford, Lord, 179-81, 293-9 
 Cockbum, General, 123 
 
INDEX. 
 
 305 
 
 Colborne, Mr. Ridley, 172 
 
 Colchester, Lord, 65 
 
 Coleridge, Lord, 188 
 
 Collins, Thos., 201 
 
 Colvin, Sidney, 49 
 
 Cook, Rev. W., 123 
 
 Cook, Mr. (R.A.), 140 
 
 Cooke, John G, 260, 264, 265 
 
 Cornelius, 210 
 
 Cotterell, Miss, 53, 54, 59, 60, 148, 
 
 149 
 Cotterell, George, 60-3, 148, 149 
 Crauford, Mr., 137, 144, 186 
 Cuvier, 173 
 
 Dallas, Mb., 175 
 
 Dana, Richard H., 274 
 
 Dante, 261, 268 
 
 Defoe, 175, 252 
 
 Denbigh, Lord, 265 
 
 Dennis, Mr., 227 
 
 Derby, Lord, 270 
 
 Devonshire, Duke of, 169, 214 
 
 Devonshire, Duchess of, 126 
 
 Dilke, Chas. W., 55, 111, 112, 132, 
 147, 160, 161, 183-7, 194-6, 
 199, 200, 253 
 
 Dilke, Mrs., 74, 98 
 
 Domett, Alfred, 260, 262-4 
 
 'Dublin University Review,' Ar- 
 ticle on J. Severn, Soi-3 
 
 Eastlake, Sib Chables, 103, 104, 
 
 128, 133, 142, 150, 157, 171, 
 
 172, 188, 189, 201, 202, 206, 
 
 210, 267 
 Edmonds, Judge, 261 
 Eglington, Earl of, 169 
 Elcho, Lord, 271 
 Eldon, Lord, 116 
 Elgin MaTbles, Severn and the, 28, 
 
 29, 32, 201 
 Elliott, Mr., 210 
 Elton, Lieut., 82, 96 
 Emmanuel, King Victor, 146, 275- 
 
 8,281 
 Erskine, Mr., 147, 205 
 ' Essays' by Joseph Severn, 
 
 ' Nature's Law of Harmony in 
 Colours,' 227 
 ' ' Light and Sound,' 227-230 
 Ewing, Mr. Wm., 93, 95, 96, 102, 
 
 103, 105, 108, 112, 129 
 Eyre, Genl. Sir Vincent, 258, 275, 
 
 282-3 
 
 Fields, James T., 272-4 
 
 Finch, Colonel, 118, 158 
 
 Fitzwilliam, Earl, 99 
 
 Flaxman, 261, 266 
 
 Florence, Severn at, 137, 157 
 
 Foote, Miss, 12, 14 
 
 Forman, Mr. Buxton, 252, 256, 260, 
 
 272, 276 
 Fox, Hon. H. E., 159, 167 
 Freeborn, Mr., 123, 130, 158, 296 
 Freeman, Edward, 1 
 Fuseli, 22, 261, 266 
 
 Gale, Mb. Fbedk., 218 
 
 Gibson, John, 65, 149, 162, 166, 
 
 172-3, 189, 266 
 Girometti, Sign. G., 177, 263 
 Gladstone, Wm. Ewart, 117, 121, 
 
 148, 203-5, 210, 214, 216, 217, 
 
 252, 254 
 Goring, Mrs., 264 
 Gott, Mr. (sculptor), 123, 124, 131, 
 
 134, 135, 149 
 
 Hallidat, Mb. Waltee, 188 
 
 Hamilton, Mr. (Founder of the 
 English Academy in Rome), 133 
 
 Hare, Augustus W., 282 
 
 Haslam, William, 12, 16, 25, 28, 
 36, 37, 42, 47, 48, 50, 52, 71-73, 
 88, 92, 93, 97, 98, 107, 160, 163, 
 183, 186, 187, 196, 202-3 ; death 
 of, 204-5 
 
 Haslam, Mary, 205 
 
 Haydn, 67, 139 
 
 Haydon, Benjamin, 16, 28, 31, 33, 
 34, 253, 254, 267 
 
 Haymarket Theatre, 11-15 
 
 Hazlitt, Wm., 149 
 
 Hessey, Mr., 86, 90, 100 
 
 Hilton, Mr. (R.A.), 65, 66, 101, 
 106-7 
 
 Holmes, Edward, 16, 88, 126, 129, 
 194-6 
 
 Home, Daniel, 260, 261 
 
 Houghton, Lord(Monckton Milnes), 
 96-7, 116, 126, 165, 174-5, 177, 
 192-6, 199-200, 204, 208, 214, 
 252-5, 263, 273, 280-4, 303 
 
 Hoxton in 1793, 2 ; Severn at, 28 
 
 Howard, Mr., 104 
 
 Hunt, Leigh, 28, 33, 42, 86-7, 98, 
 108, 111, 116, 122, 127, 129, 
 132, 136, 142-164, 175, 192, 
 194, 195, 257, 259 
 
 ' Hyperion,' Keats's, 40, 41 
 
 x 
 
306 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Ironsides, Miss, 261, 266, 267 
 Jeffrey, Lord, 196 
 
 Kean, Charles, 14 
 
 Keats, George, 17-18, 21, 28, 30, 
 41, 42, 72-76, 99, 147, 159, 160, 
 165, 177, 183, 187, 191, 194, 
 195, 255 
 
 Keats, John, 12, 16-17, 19, 91, 
 147 ; poem on Fingal's Cave, 35- 
 37; death of, 92-98; will of, 
 99-100; reminiscences of, 102- 
 114; and Shelley, 115-124; 
 memoir of, 159-166, 178-9, 183, 
 192-7, 202-3, 208, 209, 248- 
 251, 279, 284-5, 302-3 
 
 Keats, Fanny, 196, 199 ; see Llanos, 
 de 
 
 Keats, Mrs., 5 
 
 Keats, Tom, 37, 38 
 
 Keats, Frances, 252 
 
 Kemble, Charles, 12, 14 
 
 Kemble, John, 12, 14 
 
 Kestner, M., 291-2 
 
 Kirkup, Mr. Seymour, 105, 123, 
 142, 149, 158, 161, 191, 256, 
 260, 262, 266-8 
 
 Lamb, Charles, 31, 187, 195 
 Lamb, Sir Charles, 167, 210 
 ' Lamia,' by John Keats, 40 
 Landor, Walter Savage, 152, 157, 
 
 174, 222 
 Landseer, Sir E., 22, 171 
 Lansdowne, Lord, 156, 183, 203 
 L'Ariccia, Severn at, 144-8 
 Lawrence, Sir Thomas, 48, 50, 65, 
 79, 91, 108, 113, 124, 132-3, 266 
 Leopold, Prince (afterwards King 
 
 of the Belgians), 138, 153 
 Letters of Joseph Severn. See 
 Berardi, Cardinal; Brown, C. A.; 
 Brawne, Miss and Mrs. ; Cooke, 
 J. G.; Dilke, C. W.; Domett, 
 A. ; Eastlake, Sir C. ; Houghton, 
 Lord ; Easlam, W. ; Holmes, E. : 
 Hunt, L. ; Keats, John and 
 George; Kirkup, S. ; Lawrence, 
 Sir T. ; Moore, M. ; Quin, Dr. ; 
 Buskin, John ; Shelley, P. B. ; 
 Severn, Tom ; Taylor, J. ; Tre- 
 lawny ,158-9 ; Westmacott,TS..,&c. 
 Lindon, Mrs. ; see Brawne, Miss 
 
 Fanny 
 Lindsay, Lord, 210, 211 
 
 Literary work of Joseph Severn, 
 221-247 
 See also — 
 'The Dead Hand' (romance), 
 
 212, 237-247 
 'The Pale Bride ' (story), 213, 
 
 230-7 
 ' On the Vicissitudes of Keats's 
 Fame ' (article in ' The At- 
 lantic Monthly'), 173, 213, 
 222 
 Imaginary letters of J. S., 223- 
 
 227 
 ' The Lost Throne ' (novel), 247 
 Littel, Miss, 1, 2 
 
 Llanos, Senora de (Fanny Keats) 
 (see also Keats, Fanny), 196, 251- 
 254, 277 
 Longfellow, H. W., 274 
 Longley, Major John, 265 
 Lovatti, Countess, 222 
 'Love's Triumvirate' (The Pale 
 Bride), see Literary Work of J. 
 Severn 
 
 Mackintosh, J., 173 
 
 Maclise, D., 189 
 
 Manari, Signor, 289, 290 
 
 Manchester, Duke of, 169 
 
 Maria Orowther, schooner, voyage 
 
 in, 50-62, 148 
 Massimo D'Azeglio, 145-6 
 Matthew, G., Felton, 192 
 Medwin, Mrs., 161 
 Meyer, H., 259 
 Millais, Sir John, 264 
 Milnes, Monckton, see Houghton, 
 
 Lord 
 Monson, Lord, 210 
 Montgomerie, General, 150 
 , Miss E., see Severn, 
 
 Mrs. Joseph 
 Moore, Mr. Morris, 270-1 
 Morghen, Raphael, 131 
 Mote, Mr., 204 
 Moxon, 187, 196 
 Murray, Lord, 131 
 Music, Severn's love of, 138-140 
 
 Naples, 58-60, 62, 63, 128, 148 
 Newton, Sir Charles, 214, 218 
 New Zealand, C. Brown in, 197, 
 
 198 
 Northampton, Lord, 183 
 
 , Marquis of, 167, 292 
 
 Northcote, Mr. (R.A.), 34 
 
INDEX. 
 
 307 
 
 Novello, Clara, 256 
 , Edward, 258 
 
 ' Ode to a Nightingale,' by John 
 
 Keats, 39 
 Odeschalchi, Cardinal, 291 
 Odysseus (Greek chief in the 
 
 Morea), 265 
 'On Fingal's Cave,' Keats's poem, 
 
 35-37 
 Opie, 266 
 
 ' Otho * (tragedy), 164, 170 
 Overbeck, 266-7, 271, 277 
 
 Palgrave, Mk., 282-3 
 Palmerston, Lord, 214, 217 
 Parker, Admiral Sir William, 155 
 Pictures painted by Joseph Severn, 
 166-169, 210 
 See also — 
 ' Alexander the Great reading 
 
 Homer,' 126, 128, 134 
 ' Ancient Mariner,' 188-9, 207 
 ' Ariel ' (sketch), 273 
 ' At the Graye of Keats,' 200 
 ' Christ entering Jerusalem,' 33 
 ' Death of Alcibiades,' 67, 101, 
 
 103, 107, 113, 140 
 ' Godfrey and his army in sight 
 
 of Jerusalem,' 182, 185, 186 
 ' Greek Hill-shepherds rescuing 
 
 a lamb from an Eagle,' 126, 
 
 134 
 'Hermia and Helena,' 22, 23, 
 
 34, 45, 46 
 'Isabella,' 275 
 ' Italian Vintage,' 144-7 
 ' King Lear,' 144 
 ' Lear and Cordelia,' 152 
 ' Mother and Child,' 138, 140 
 'Madonna della Sedia,' 137, 
 
 144 
 ' Marriage of Cana,' 275, 277, 
 
 303 
 Miniatures, 24 ; of Keats, 45- 
 
 47 
 Portrait of Mr. Gladstone, 204 
 Portrait of Lord Houghton, 
 
 204 
 ' Quentin Durward,' scenes in, 
 
 144 
 ' Rescue of Lorenzo di Medici 
 
 from assassination,' 137-8, 
 
 140 
 'The Cave of Despair,' 23, 24, 
 
 26,34 
 
 Pictures — continued. 
 
 ' The Falconer,' 167 
 
 « The Fountain,' 151 
 
 ' The Infant of the Apoca- 
 lypse,' 168-9 
 
 ' Titania Sleeping,' 46 
 
 ' Warrior and Lady,' 156 
 Pidgeon, Mrs., 54 
 Pope Pius IX., 268-9, 278 
 Purcell, 138-140 
 
 Quin, Dr., 215-6 
 
 Ramsay, Mrs., 261 
 Raphael, 212, 222, 270 
 Rawlings, Mrs., see Mrs. Keats 
 Redgrave, R., 189 
 Redington, Sir Thomas, 167 
 Religious Art in England, Mr. 
 
 Ruskin and, 210-212 
 Rembrandt, 190 
 Reinhardt, Signor, 298 
 Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 8, 105, 108, 
 
 114 
 , John Hamilton, 17, 28, 
 
 30, 31, 33, 101, 109, 111, 194, 
 
 196 
 Richards, Mr., 74, 88, 111, 112, 
 
 127, 129, 132, 186, 187 
 Richards, Mrs., 88, 98 
 Richmond, George (R.A.), 189-191, 
 
 202, 205, 278 
 Ridley, Sir M. W., 167 
 Robertson, Prof., 301-3 
 Rogers, Samuel, 114, 115, 203, 257 
 Rome, Keats and Severn in, 64-71, 
 
 103, 106, 125, 128, 149, 153-6, 
 
 179-83, 275-9 ; and Appendix 
 Rossetti, Dante G., 282, 283 
 Royal Academy, 25-8, 34, 132, 133 
 Ruskin, Mr., 148, 189, 202, 205-7, 
 
 210-12, 217-9, 220, 221, 278, 279 
 Russell, Mr. Odo (Lord Ampthill), 
 
 214, 222 
 Russell, Lord John, 214, 216, 217 
 Russell, Lord William, 105, 146, 
 
 147 
 Russia, Emperor of, 25, 169, 188 
 Ruthven, Lord, 105 
 Ruthven, Lady, 105 
 
 St. Leonards, Lord (Lord Chan- 
 cellor), 116 
 Scott, Sir Walter, 169, 173, 257 
 Severn, Arthur, 174, 213, and Pre- 
 face 
 
308 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Severn, Charles, 2, 5, 39 
 
 Severn, James, 1-4, 6, 7 
 
 Severn, Mrs. James, 2, 49 
 
 Severn, Joseph, birth and early 
 training, 1-6 ; apprentice to an 
 engraver, 6-11; narrow escape 
 from death at Haymarket 
 Theatre, 11-15; and John and 
 George Keats, 16-101 ; gains the 
 gold medal, 27; Eeats, Shelley, 
 and, 115-24; marriage of, 156- 
 8; and Keats -Memoir, 177-9, 
 192-200, 248-56; cholera in 
 Rome, 179-83; death of son, 
 185 ; last news of C. Brown, 197, 
 198 ; Consul years at Borne, 275- 
 79 ; death of, 280-85 ; reminis- 
 cences of, 301-3 ; see also, Essays, 
 Letters, Pictures, Writings 
 (Miscellaneous) 
 
 Severn, Mrs. Joseph, 150, 151, 
 156-8, 161, 167, 221 
 
 Severn, Maria, 62, 71, 147, 218 
 
 Severn, Tom, 5, 51, 52, 128, 138- 
 40, 152, 353 
 
 Severn, Walter, 167, 213, 218-20, 
 "264, 265, 282 ; and Preface 
 
 Shakespeare, John Keats, on, 18, 
 117 
 
 Shelley, Mary, 203, 204 
 
 Shelley, Percy B., 33, 43, 63, 96 ; 
 and Keats, 115-24; E. Holmes 
 and, 126, 127; drowning of, 
 129, 130, 135, 250, 262-4 
 
 SheUey, William, 121, 122 
 
 Shelley, Lady, 277 
 
 Siddons, Sarah, 11-15 
 
 Smith, Mr. Horace, 107, 158 
 
 Speed, John Gilmer, 253, 254 
 
 Spenser's ' Fairie Queene,' 22, 23 
 
 Stephens, Miss, 12, 14 
 
 Stothard, Thos., 266 
 
 Sullivan, Lieut., 60, 61 
 
 Sykes, Major Richard, 210 
 
 Sykes, Sir C, 123 
 
 Taparellt, M., see Azeglio, Mar- 
 quis of 
 Taylor, Jeremy, 91 
 , John, 53, 74, 79, 80, 86, 90, 
 
 Taylor, John — continued. 
 
 99-100, 106-112, 120, 131, 166, 
 
 187, 194, 195, 209 
 Taylor, Sir Brook, 214, 292 
 Tennvson, Lord, 282 
 Tintoretto, 190 
 Titian, 32, 190, 204, 228, 238 
 Tosti, Cardinal, 291, 298 
 Trelawny, Edgar, 264 
 
 , Sir John S., 265 
 
 , Edward, 122, 135, 136, 
 
 158, 159, 170, 171, 191, 195, 
 
 264, 265, 281 
 Trench, Archbishop, 282, 283 
 Trollope, T. Adolphus, 281 
 Turner, J. W., 152, 186, 266 
 
 Uwnrs, Thomas, 148, 152, 202 
 
 Vandyke, 8 
 
 Vaughan, Sir E., 210 
 
 Venice, Severn at, 128, 137, 138, 
 
 142, 190, 191 
 Vesuvius, Mount, 59 
 Victoria, Queen, 210, 215 
 
 W ardour, Lokd and Lady, Arun- 
 del, 290 
 Warwick, Lord and Lady, 209, 
 
 210 
 Weld, Cardinal,, 168, 169, 214, 
 
 290, 301 
 Wells, Charles, 24 
 West, B., 266 
 Westmacott, Richard, Junr. (R.A.), 
 
 123, 138, 141, 143, 149, 171, 173 
 Westmorland, Countess of, 105, 
 
 113, 126, 148, 150, 151, 157 
 Whistler, Mr., 4 
 Wilkie, 186 
 
 Williams, Captain, 129, 264 
 Wiseman, Monsignor, 300 
 Woodhouse, R., 165, 166, 170, 177, 
 
 194 
 Wordsworth, the poet, 31, 33, 207 
 Writings, miscellaneous, of Joseph 
 
 Severn, see Literary Work. 
 Wyatt, Mr. (sculptor), 172, 189 
 
 Yakborough, Lord, 172 
 
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