.. a
damaged but typographically intact copy....
I had, once before, dipped into his _Endymion_ and had been discouraged
... but this time I began to read him with his very first lines--his
dedication to Leigh Hunt, beginning:
"Glory and loveliness have passed away."
Then I went on to a pastoral piece:
"I stood tiptoe upon a little hill."
I forgot where I was. A new world of beauty was opened to me.... I read
and read....
"Come, Gregory, it's time to close"--a voice at my elbow. It was
Breasted's assistant, a little, curious man who reminded me of my
sky-pilot at Sydney. He, also, wore a black, long-tailed coat. He was
known as "the perfessor."
"You've been standing here as quiet as a crane for three hours."
"How much do you want for this book?"
"A quarter ... for you!" He always affected to make me special
reductions, as an old customer....
A quarter was all I had. I paid for my Keats, and walked home. Walked? I
went with wings on each heel. I was as genuinely converted to a new life
as a sinner is converted to the Christian religion.
I lit the light in my room. All night I read and re-read, not a whit
sleepy or tired.
I went for a week in a mad dream, my face shining and glowing with inner
ecstasy and happiness.
* * * * *
There did not seem to be time enough in the twenty-four hours of each
day for reading and studying and writing.
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