Amy Lowell: John Keats

It was certainly a very questionable proceeding to leave Tom alone in Hampstead, and Keats must have had a good deal of trouble in squaring his going with his conscience.

But before we condemn him for his final decision, we must take into due consideration his morbid state, and think soberly of what the effect of his staying under the circumstances would have been on Tom. If he had been well and in good spirits, able in all respects to cheer Tom up and care for him, then certainly he should have stayed. But he was not well, and his spirits were at the lowest ebb.

The chances are that, reasoning from the facts as he saw them, he did the wise thing in regard to Tom by going; for we must remember that he had no idea how ill Tom really was, and firmly believed that he himself should return from his trip quite rested and refreshed, and much better able to look after Tom during the Winter.

Besides, Mrs. Bentley was a most reliable woman, the Dilkes were close by, and Haslam, Severn, Wells, and other good friends, were sure to keep Tom from feeling lonely. Severn and Haslam had been invited to be of the walking party, but had refused, Severn on account of lack of cash, Haslam probably for business reasons. Of course, Keats’s decision to tramp about Scotland for two months was, as regards his own health, a ghastly blunder; but neither he nor the family doctor, Mr. Sawrey, had apparently the faintest conception that his “indisposition” had any underlying cause.

Amy Lowell