It is strange how much genuine poetry lingers in this odd collection
of verses in praise of prizefighting. There are lines and phrases that
recall Keats himself, though truly the tone of the book is robust
enough to satisfy the most impassioned of Tory editors. As it happens,
it was written by Keats's dearest friend, by John Hamilton Reynolds,
whom the great poet mentions so affectionately in the latest of all
his letters. Reynolds has been treated with scant consideration by the
critics. His verses, I protest, are no whit less graceful or sparkling
than those of his more eminent companions, Leigh Hunt and Barry
Cornwall. His _Garden of Florence_ is worthy of the friend of Keats.
We have seen how his _Peter Bell_, which was Peter Bell the First,
took the wind out of Shelley's satiric sails and fluttered the
dove-cotes of the Lakeists. He was as smart as he could be, too clever
to live, in fact, too light a weight for a grave age. In _The Fancy_,
which Keats seems to refer to in a letter dated January 13th, 1820,
Reynolds appears to have been inspired by Tom Moore's _Tom Crib_, but
if so, he vastly improves on that rather vulgar original. He takes as
his motto, with adroit impertinence, some lines of Wordsworth, and
persuades us
_nor need we blame the licensed joys,
Though false to Nature's quiet equipoise:
Frank are the sports, the stains are fugitive_.
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