Page:Table-Talk, vol. 2 (1822).djvu/117

 proper post, picking his teeth and mincing an opinion, sheltered by rank, bowing to wealth—a poet framed, glazed, and hung in a striking light; not a straggling weed, torn and trampled on; not a poor Kit-run-the-street, but a powdered beau, a sycophant plant, an exotic reared in a glass case, hermetically sealed,

whose mealy coat no moth can corrupt nor blight can wither. The poet Keats had not this sort of protection for his person—he lay bare to weather—the serpent stung him, and the poison-tree dropped upon this little western flower:—when the mercenary servile crew approached him, he had no pedigree to show them, no rent-roll to hold out in reversion for their praise: he was not in any great man’s train, nor the butt and puppet of a lord—he could only offer them “the fairest flowers of the season, carnations and streaked gilliflowers,”—“rue for remembrance and pansies for thoughts,”—they recked not of his gift, but tore him with hideous shouts and laughter,

Unless an author has all establishment of his own, or is entered on that of some other person,