My dear Sirs--I had no idea of your getting on so fast--I thought of bringing my 4th Book to Town all in good time for you--especially after the late unfortunate chance. I did not however for my own sake delay finishing the copy which was done a few days after my arrival here. I send it off to-day, and will tell you in a Postscript at what time to send for it from the Bull and Mouth or other Inn. You will find the Preface and dedication and the title Page as I should wish it to stand--for a Romance is a fine thing notwithstanding the circulating Libraries. My respects to Mrs. Hessey and to Percy Street. Yours very sincerely JOHN KEATS. _P.S._--I have been advised to send it to you--you may expect it on Monday--for I sent it by the Postman to Exeter at the same time with this Letter. Adieu! XLV.--TO JAMES RICE. Teignmouth, Tuesday [March 24, 1818]. My dear Rice--Being in the midst of your favourite Devon, I should not, by rights, pen one word but it should contain a vast portion of Wit, Wisdom and learning--for I have heard that Milton ere he wrote his answer to Salmasius came into these parts, and for one whole month, rolled himself for three whole hours (per day?), in a certain meadow hard by us--where the mark of his nose at equidistances is still shown. The exhibitor of the said meadow further saith, that, after these rollings, not a nettle sprang up in all the seven acres for seven years, and that from the said time, a new sort of plant was made from the whitethorn, of a thornless nature, very much used by the bucks of the present day to rap their boots withal. This account made me very naturally suppose that the nettles and thorns etherealised by the scholar's rotatory motion, and garnered in his head, thence flew after a process of fermentation against the luckless Salmasius and occasioned his well-known and unhappy end. What a happy thing it would be if we could settle our thoughts and make our minds up on any matter in five minutes, and remain content--that is, build a sort of mental cottage of feelings, quiet and pleasant--to have a sort of Philosophical back-garden, and cheerful holiday-keeping front one--but alas! this never can be: for as the material cottager knows there are such places as France and Italy, and the Andes and burning mountains, so the spiritual Cottager has knowledge of the terra semi-incognita of things unearthly, and cannot for his life keep in the check-rein--or I should stop here quiet and comfortable in my theory of nettles. You will see, however, I am obliged to run wild being attracted by the load-stone concatenation. No sooner had I settled the knotty point of Salmasius, than the Devil put this whim into my head in the likeness of one of Pythagoras's questionings--Did Milton do more good or harm in the world? He wrote, let me inform you (for I have it from a friend, who had it of ----,) he wrote Lycidas, Comus, Paradise Lost and other Poems, with much delectable prose--He was moreover an active