Life of John Keats

he soon, however, separated from Rawlings, and lived with her mother at Edmonton. After her death Keats hid himself for some days in a nook under his master's desk, passionately inconsolable. The four children, who inherited from their grandparents (chiefly from their grandmother) a moderate fortune of nearly £8,000 altogether, in which the daughter had the largest share, were then left under the guardianship of Mr. Abbey, a city merchant residing at Walthamstow. At the age of fifteen, or at some date before the close of 1810, John quitted his school.

A little stave of doggrel which Keats wrote to his sister, probably in July 1818, gives a glimpse of what he was like at the time when he and his brothers were living with their grandmother.

"There was a naughty boy, And a naughty boy was he: He kept little fishes In washing-tubs three, In spite Of the might Of the maid, Nor afraid Of his granny good. He often would Hurly-burly Get up early And go By hook or crook To the brook, And bring home