so tremendous an accident; and, if you think it as necessary as I do, so long as you continue to find Pisa or its neighbourhood agreeable to you, Mrs. Shelley unites with myself in urging the request that you would take up your residence with us.  You might come by sea to Leghorn (France is not worth seeing, and the sea is particularly good for weak lungs)—­which is within a few miles of us.  You ought, at all events, to see Italy; and your health, which I suggest as a motive, may be an excuse to you.  I spare declamation about the statues and paintings and ruins, and (what is a greater piece of forbearance) about the mountains and streams, the fields, the colours of the sky, and the sky itself.

’I have lately read your Endymion again, and even with a new sense of the treasures of poetry it contains—­though treasures poured forth with indistinct profusion.  This people in general will not endure; and that is the cause of the comparatively few copies which have been sold.  I feel persuaded that you are capable of the greatest things, so you but will.  I always tell Ollier to send you copies of my books. Prometheus Unbound I imagine you will receive nearly at the same time with this letter. The Cenci I hope you have already received:  it was studiously composed in a different style.

“Below the good how far! but far above the great[3]!”

In poetry I have sought to avoid system and mannerism.  I wish those who excel me in genius would pursue the same plan.

’Whether you remain in England, or journey to Italy, believe that you carry with you my anxious wishes for your health and success—­wherever you are, or whatever you undertake—­and that I am

’Yours sincerely,

‘P.B.  SHELLEY.’

Keats’s reply to Shelley ran as follows:—­

’Hampstead—­August 10, 1820.

’MY DEAR SHELLEY,

’I am very much gratified that you, in a foreign country, and with a mind almost over-occupied, should write to me in the strain of the letter beside me.  If I do not take advantage of your invitation, it will be prevented by a circumstance I have very much at heart to prophesy[4].  There is no doubt that an English winter would put an end to me, and do so in a lingering hateful manner.  Therefore I must either voyage or journey to Italy, as a soldier marches up to a battery.  My nerves at present are the worst part of me:  yet they feel soothed that, come what extreme may, I shall not be destined to remain in one spot long enough to take a hatred of any four particular bedposts.

’I am glad you take any pleasure in my poor poem—­which I would willingly take the trouble to unwrite if possible, did I care so much as I have done about reputation.